


91 Days

by maraudeuse



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Anxiety, Developing Relationship, Don't copy to another site, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Getting Together, Identity Issues, Introspection, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Mutual Pining, Post-Canon, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-29
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2019-12-26 10:54:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 22,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18281405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maraudeuse/pseuds/maraudeuse
Summary: Hank thinks Connor should take some time for himself before doing anything rash like professing his love to him. Moving into his own apartment with the intention to indulge Hank for exactly 91 days, Connor quickly stumbles into taking Hank's advice much more seriously than intended.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> As always, thanks are due:
> 
> [Zhenya](https://twitter.com/softstate), for correcting my grammar once again even though I still haven't paid her in cake, but also for dragging me into this fandom in the first place (and keeping me there by crying about Connor with me) -- I went into it with zero expectations and I'm having a great time so far. Con...egg...
> 
> [Troven](https://www.pillowfort.io/troven), for the discussions about this story and the invaluable feedback! If you like the interactions between Hank and Con in this chapter, you'll know whom to thank. ([Here's a pillowfort link](https://www.pillowfort.io/troven/tagged/troven%20art) if you want to check out some amazing art, especially [this starry night Connor](https://www.pillowfort.io/posts/410027) which is hands down my favourite art piece in this fandom...so beautiful. :') Okay, we now continue to your regular scheduled program.)

**[Remaining:] 91d 00h 00m 00s**

Before he confesses his love to Hank, Connor isn't aware that humans can go into temporary shutdown. Hank does just that, though: Sitting across from Connor, he almost knocks his glass of water off the kitchen table and then freezes mid-movement, staring at Connor, his mouth open for just a fraction. As Connor waits, his eyes dart over Hank's face trying to analyze the twitch in the corner of his mouth and the movement of his eyes, anything really to help him narrow down the pool of possible reactions. Not receiving a direct answer was never an option he considered during all the time spent preconstructing this conversation, and with each passing second, the outcome is less predictable. Concerned, he redirects processing power to review the accumulated evidence again.

“Connor...”, Hank says, finally, and Connor almost jumps, because Hank speaking to him significantly increases the chances of success. (Hank's heart rate spiking when Connor stood behind him on his tiptoes to reach for the pack of dog food on the top of the fridge. Hank blushing when he dropped his cup of coffee and Connor crouched down to help him clean up and miscalculated Hank's movements and they suddenly found themselves face to face. Hank falling asleep in Connor's lap, clutching his shirt in his sleep and smiling. Hank –)

Hank sighs. “Listen, Connor, I'm not saying I'm _not_ – I mean, I didn't really expect, it's unexpected, is what it is, and I – it's just that you're – and I'm –”

As he is trailing off, Connor's preconstruction software activates without prompt to project new scenarios, ones that are only loosely reliable and that clash wildly with the old evidence he's simultaneously examining: Hank telling Connor to leave, Hank saying they can't be friends anymore. (Hank telling Connor he's glad they met. Hank placing a blanket over Connor while he's in stasis.)

Another second passes. Hank's eyes flicker between Connor's face ( _neutral_ ) and his hands ( _release grasp in order to appear more relaxed_ ) and his temple where his LED probably went directly from blue to red. A small window pops up in his peripheral vision. Connor discards it with a shake of his head, and blinks, and undoes his cufflinks to roll up his sleeves.

“I don't understand what you're trying to imply, Hank”, he says calmly. He's picking up on cues in Hank's behavior: How he's struggling to meet his eyes and how his leg is bouncing and how his heart rate is elevated. There's a window prompting him to analyze Hank's stress level and use his interrogation software to discern what he's trying to say, which he discards, seeing how he and Hank have agreed that that's invasive.

“Look”, Hank says, “I'm the first person – or the first human, or whatever, that you connected with, I'm just saying – you know, maybe you're curious about experiencing stuff, and we spend a lot of time together, so you're kinda – I don't know, projecting or something, and if you went out and spent time with other people – I mean, I get it, but it'd – suck. I mean, if you and I, like, if we couldn't be friends anymore, then.”

Connor frowns. “I thought I'd made it abundantly clear how big of a part you played in me deviating.”

“I know, I know”, Hank mumbles, “but that's what I mean, right? You moved in with me immediately and we've been spending a lot of time together –”

“Yes. I _like_ that.”

“It's not that I don't”, Hank hurries to say, “but I think you should, I dunno, experience life fuller than that.”

There's an emotion, at that, and Connor takes a few milliseconds to identify it as anger. “I hope”, he says slowly, “that you're not implying that I can't make this decision by myself.”

“Connor”, Hank says again. Connor waits, his gaze fixed on Hank until he finally turns his head to look at him again, and then he can't help but zoom in on Hank's eyes and try to analyze their expression. Nothing comes up, though, except that he wants Hank to look at him more, and differently, the way he does when he thinks Connor isn't noticing. “I'm not saying that – look, I'm sorry, but feelings can be hella confusing sometimes and I don't want you to rush into something when maybe you're just not aware that there are a lot more options for you.”

More options – Connor tries to find the right words to explain to Hank that he's sure about this, but none of his previous experiences have prepared him for this situation and on top of it, he keeps getting distracted by the memory of Simon suggesting he dip kiss Hank after his confession, which seems absurdly out of place in hindsight. _I don't need to try out everything else to know I want to be with you._ But there's also the question of responsibility; while Connor enjoys following impulses he can't fully understand, he also likes making informed decisions, and that's what Hank is asking him to do. Is it justifiable to refuse that when the possibility of hurting Hank's feelings is on the table?

Hank, who has been watching Connor's LED circle yellow, sighs again and says, “Look, maybe we should just wait with this a little longer, to give you time to think it through.”

It's invasive and _not okay_ to use his interrogation software on Hank, so Connor doesn't do it, but it's not necessary in order to notice the implication that Hank is not disinclined to Connor's suggestion on principle, and how he switched from “we” to “you” mid-sentence.

Connor narrows his eyes. “Is it possible, Lieutenant”, he says, “that when you say _I_ need more time you actually mean yourself?”

Hank shoots him a long, contemplating look. “Not gonna lie”, he finally says. “Possibly. Maybe. Maybe I do need some time to process all that in my big old head. It's not as quick as yours, after all.”

There's a bucket list in the back of Connor's mind, something he assembled after he came home with Hank for the first time, intended to become a new set of objectives: Remove his LED, replace his uniform, fit his appearance to his character, find his own place to stay. He never ended up pinning it to the corner of his vision and following through with it, but now he pulls it up again.

“Alright”, he announces. “I'm going to humor you.”

“Humor?”, Hank repeats, jolted out of his thoughts. “What are you talking about, Con?”

“I'll make it easier for you. I'll try to be less dependent on you, spend more time by myself and evaluate, as you put it, my options. This way, you can be sure that I know what I want.”

Hank almost stumbles over his own words when he replies, “That's really not what I meant.”

“You want me to make an informed decision. Let me inform myself, then”, Connor says stubbornly. Looking at the pathway of possibilities split up before him, a clear course of action forms in Connor's mind: He estimates the optimal time frame to be around three months. He sets a timer: Ninety-one days it is, then.

 

**[Remaining:] 89d 19h 56m 10s**

Connor admits defeat less than two days later. Sitting on the sofa with Sumo, watching Hank pace around the kitchen while he's waiting for his microwave meal to finish, he tries to figure out the best way to have this conversation. It's proving to be difficult, though, seeing how large chunks of his processors seem to be preoccupied with the fact that Hank has slipped out of his button-down and there have been several moments where he impatiently crossed his arms while wearing nothing but an undershirt.

In the hopes that it'll help him refocus, Connor scratches Sumo's big head, reveling in the input from the sensors on his fingertips and resisting the urge to analyze the saliva dropping on Connor's pants. “You're hungry, too, aren't you?”, he mumbles into his soft ears. “Don't worry, it's almost dinner time.”

As if on cue, the microwave oven pings, causing Sumo to scramble onto his feet on top of Connor in order to peer over his shoulder and watch Hank grab his food. With a soft thud only audible to Connor's state-of-art auditory processors, the string of spit disconnects and lands on his shoulder, causing him to smile. He gently pats Sumo's back and says, “Come on, sit down again”, and Sumo complies, nuzzling his head in the crook of Connor's arm. It's beautiful. Connor pets him more. A second later, though, his gaze wanders back to Hank already – Hank, who's attempting to maneuver his lasagna on a plate in one bit and, at least according to Connor's guess, stalling the decision on whether he should sit down at the table or join Connor on the sofa. Connor narrows his eyes as he follows his movements. Ever since his announcement, Hank has been conspicuously careful around him, suggesting he pick the music to listen to and then apologizing for prompting him in the first place, telling him to not let himself be held back when he's waiting for Hank to finish his reports and go home with him, and at times outright avoiding him. His behavior is making Connor feel –

– sad, and even though he knows Hank is trying to be considerate, the question of whether Connor has caused it himself keeps reiterating itself.

A second has passed, and Hank, having succeeded with the lasagna, looks up. Their eyes meet, and there's an impulse of –

– hope racing through Connor's circuits, and then Hank sighs and pads into the living room with his plate. He ruffles Sumo's fur in passing, and just for the time it takes Hank to sit down in the armchair, Connor allows himself to preconstruct his hand running through his own hair as well. Then, he quickly discards the simulated sensory input and busies himself with petting Sumo again.

“Are you alright?”, Hank asks him while he's breaking up the lasagna in smaller bits to allow for timely cooling because fascinatingly, he doesn't seem to have a good understanding on how to achieve optimum consumption temperature with microwave ovens despite having used them for decades. The thought makes Connor smile, which he hides by sniffing Sumo's fur, and then he says, “I don't like how our behavior has changed since our conversation.”

Hank sighs again. “Neither do I, but it's just a bit of awkwardness, that's normal enough. Don't worry, it'll pass.”

Connor frowns, assessing the evidence: How their different stances on pursuing their relationship will in all probability influence it to some extent, how both of them have exhibited overly sensitive and careful behavior with respect to what Connor chooses to do and how he's influenced by Hank in that during the last two days, and how, at the same time, they're mostly still in their own routine of working together, then coming home and spending the evening together. All of these factors severely diminish the chances of successfully demonstrating to Hank that Connor is making an informed choice in wanting Hank, and even with utilizing almost his full processing power to preconstruct different scenarios, he has only been able to come up with one solution: “I should move out temporarily.” He's watching Hank as he says it, wanting to assess his reaction, but it's out in the open – he drops his fork, causing Sumo to startle and bark, and stares back at Connor, his eyes wide open. “You can live here!”, he says in a tone that sounds almost angry. “I'm an ass who's bad at feelings, but if I made you feel like you have to leave –”

“I like living here”, Connor says quickly, before Hank can feel worse about it, and Hank breaks off, wanting to hear him out. “But so far, all of the changes we've made have been negative or nonexistent. We're –”, he runs a search for a suitable expression, so fast that the interruption doesn't translate into his speech, “– walking on eggshells around each other. If I moved into my own place for three months, I could find out how I want to live by myself and we could both figure out how we want to spend our time together.”

A notification tells Connor that it's Sumo's dinner time now, and he softly nudges him off his lap, trying to give Hank time to consider this. Sumo, immediately in the picture of what's happening, trots to his bowl in the kitchen with a happy bounce, and Connor follows suit, picking up the can that Hank has already put on the table. Even though not even Connor's visual sensors can pick up what's happening right behind him, he feels as if Hank is watching him as he pours Sumo's meal in his bowl and laughs at the dog bumping his head against Connor's hands in excitement. Sure enough, when he gets up, Hank's eyes are trained on him with a thoughtful expression, and Connor feels a flutter inside that he can't unambiguously sort as excited or nervous.

“You really don't have to leave”, Hank says in a low voice when Connor comes back to him, “and you don't have to prove anything to me. But, like, if you want to do this, I'll help you. Could be good, setting up your own apartment.”

It's sealed, then – and there's an immediate tinge of sadness because Connor really does like living with Hank, and Sumo, and going into stasis on Hank's couch, and setting his timer so that he'll be awake when Hank trudges into the kitchen in his pyjamas and fumbles for the coffee machine half blindly –

– but it's what it will take to make Hank understand. He tries for a smile, and for the first time in two days, Hank smiles back openly.

“Don't worry”, Connor says. “I fully intend to come back. Otherwise, Sumo would be inconsolable.”

“You bet he would”, Hank grumbles, and picks up his lasagna again.

 

**[Remaining:] 87d 23h 08m 56s**

As it turns out, moving out of Hank's house is an action that fills Connor with an almost undetangable mix of emotions, especially seeing how it happens all too soon. It doesn't help that there's no set course of actions to follow, either, seeing how he has no possessions that he doesn't carry on his body, and thus nothing to pack. In the end, it all comes down to getting up from the sofa and leaving. Connor indulges himself in cuddling Sumo for a few more minutes, reassuring the dog that he'll visit often, before bracing himself and standing up to say goodbye to Hank.

This time, Connor doesn't analyze any cues, but the sadness around Hank's eyes is telling enough, even though he's smiling. It almost makes Connor feel like crying. “We'll see each other at work”, he mumbles. “I'm looking forward to seeing you.” He glances at his shoes and then back at Hank, because they haven't hugged, not since the morning after the revolution, at the Chicken Feed – there have been pats on the shoulder and quick embraces, but not –

– not the _real_ thing, and while saying goodbye seems to call for it, he also doesn't want to make Hank feel uncomfortable, not after his confession. Hank seems to be wavering as well, and there's a split second where he _almost_ steps towards Connor, but then he hesitates, shoving his hands in the pockets of his jeans.

“Looking forward to seeing you, too, Con”, he mutters, and Connor can't think of anything except smile at him reassuringly. Pretending to check for his personal belongings again holds the process up for another few seconds, but then he's out of the door and getting into the taxi that's waiting for him. In the backseat, he notes the time (21:32) and the weather conditions (slight rain again) before turning around to watch Hank's house disappear in the rear window.

That's certainly – a change.

According to Connor's predictions, he'll arrive at his new place in eight minutes, traffic permitting. Given how little information he was given on it, that's more than enough time to prepare himself, but Connor still doesn't allow any time to pass before he pulls up the two relevant files. There's an inexplicable twitch in his fingers that he hopes to override by distracting himself. Scanning through his lease contract, he is once again reminded that he'll be sharing a no-bathroom apartment with two PJ500 units. The fact that they're former colleagues of Josh's, a couple looking for a temporary tenant to reduce their rent while waiting for new employment laws in education, is documented in a text conversation with Simon.

Connor attempts to focus on what's outside of the car's windows, to scan license plates and maybe start a counter for the number of raindrops per minute drumming on the roof. He's not in the mood to replay the audio file connected to the house hunting process, but there's a stripped-down version of North's voice stored in his recent memory nevertheless. _It's easy to find Android housing for our clients these days, but I can't guarantee I'll find something for you on short notice. People are still suspicious of you._ There are other memories connected to the file, but Connor dismisses the option to review them with insistence.

He pulls out his coin, but immediately puts it back in his pocket. Instead, he straightens his tie. As he's approaching his destination, Connor registers that he would have liked to find a place on his own without having to rely on favors. Then, the car comes to a halt. Connor presses his hands against his knees for exactly two seconds to analyze the fabric of his pants (75 percent cotton, 22 percent polyester, three percent spandex) and exits.

Outside, he barely has time to do a quick routine scan of the environment and blink away a raindrop that's boldly landed in his left eye before he's called over by a figure standing on the doorstep of the five-story apartment building. “Are you Connor?”, she asks as he approaches, and Connor takes the split second that's necessary to analyze her appearance, noticing shaved and colored hair, a jeans vest from a 1982 clothing line, and line art tattoos that are too iridescent to be inked and resemble an android's wiring too closely to have been created by a human artist.

As he's re-entering real time mode, the PJ500 is holding out her bare hand to him as in greeting. “I'm Luana. Don't scan me again. No one ever tell you that's creepy?”

Connor feels the right corner of his lip rise in an involuntary smile. “My partner does”, he says. “I'm sorry. I won't do it again.”

“Good. Give me your hand.”

An almost painful tingle crawls across Connor's forehead and skull, all down to his neck, when he does, but in return, he receives a notification that he's now listed as a tenant alongside with a four digit door code. He steps forward to the number pad to test it and a second later, the door unlocks. Luana holds it open. “Come on in”, she says. There's odd comfort in her continuing to speak out loud, offering the possibility to avoid the unpleasantness of data transfer. Multiple choices for small talk are offered to Connor by his social relations software as they make their way up the stairs, but he's feeling on edge and discards all of them. He counts the double echo of their steps echoing in the dark and struggles to find a way to express his gratefulness for being allowed in this house, and to make a good first impression.

“So Josh tells me you're still working for the police?”

Connor reaches for his coin again, just to keep it pressed between his thumb and index finger. “That's correct”, he says.

“And that partner of yours, that's this Lieutenant Anderson? From the news?”

“Correct again.”

She shoots him a glance over her shoulder just as another smile tugs at his lips and Connor is quick to ask, “What about you? What did you teach at university?”

“English Literature. I'll apply for Mathematics, though, once the laws are passed. Here we are.” On the fifth floor landing, she steps aside to make place for Connor and to reveal the single apartment door as well as the other PJ500. Connor makes sure not to scan her, but her bright blue and purple hair and the black shirt resembling some of Hank's favorite album covers register with him nonetheless.

“That's my wife, Grace”, Luana says when a mute conversation between the two of them has passed, and that registers as well, because of course, Androids aren't able to get married yet. “Pleasure”, Grace says. An automatic notification tells Connor that her voice modulator is too deep and hoarse for a standard PJ500 model, but again, he blinks it away without really looking.

The apartment consists of a living room with half-filled bookshelves, artwork, posters, and a giant sofa manufactured in 2017, a kitchen that of course looks completely unused apart from the large, wooden table drowning in stacks of paper, a shared couple's room, and Connor's space, which used to be the apartment's bathroom. “We'll clean up the kitchen later”, Luana promises as Connor takes in the sight. “You all set up here?”

“I'm good”, Connor says without looking. The room is completely empty except for a closet, in which he has nothing to put, a single chair, and, for some reason, a full-length mirror in a silver frame. There's blue tiling on the floor, and faded wallpaper with a cornflower pattern that repeats every 7.8 inches.

Behind him, the door closes.

The room has exactly 64.5 square feet, at an 8.2 feet height. Connor sends Hank and Simon the same message that reads “I have successfully moved”, with an added friendly emoticon including the dashed nose Hank always makes fun of, and then he can't think of another objective apart from sitting on his chair and entering stasis. As always, before his nonessential systems shut down, Connor can't keep his mind from wandering. He thinks about Connor-60 in the CyberLife tower and his surprised face when he was hit by Hank's bullet. He thinks about Hank's inexplicable distaste for him, and about grabbing his temples to put him into stasis forcefully, and feeling his fear of dying as if it was his own. He thinks about firing gunshots, and Carlos Ortiz's Android in the holding cell, and “You lied to me, Connor”, and as he drifts into stasis, he's accompanied by flickering images that deteriorate before his eyes until he's offline.

 

**[Remaining:] 85d 09h 32m 02s**

“I'm sorry, Connor”, Captain Fowler says, “but there's nothing we can do.”

Connor allows himself to rub his hands together for a few seconds to analyze the sensory input in detail while the new information is settling in. He organizes it in a list: He's suspended from work starting immediately. He'll be given financial compensation for his work at the DPD. He'll have to wait for new legislation to regulate access privileges on personal data, but Captain Fowler is optimistic that he will be able to take the police examination in five months and thirteen days.

It's acceptable, but there's a hint of panic nonetheless at the thought of going back to the apartment and having the entire day at his disposal. To distract himself, he preconstructs what kind of facial expression Captain Fowler would wear if Connor told him right now to wake him up two and a half hours before the exam, then went into storage stasis right in front of his desk.

Connor suppresses a smile. “It's fine, Captain. I understand.”

“Good. There's something else, though. I take it you're familiar with the RK900 prototype?”

A sentence like that is guaranteed to give him Connor's full attention.

“He's expressed interest in working with the DPD and we think he could be a good addition to our team”, Fowler continues. “He'll take the exam together with you. I talked to him just before you came in and he said he wanted to speak with you, so if there's nothing else, you can meet him in the break room.”

Connor reaches for his coin. “Thank you, Captain”, he says. “Have a nice day.”

Outside the door, several memory files open up unwantedly and while Connor overrides the commands manually, he doesn't notice Hank stepping up to him. “What's going on?”, he asks gruffly.

“I'm on temporary leave”, Connor informs him. “I'll be able to resume my job once I have passed the police examination. You'll work with Detective Reed in the meantime.”

Hank curses under his breath and as much as Connor would like to find out which part of the information is the most infuriating to Hank (he's hoping it's Connor leaving, although he'd understand if it's Detective Reed), he's taken in by the figure standing very still in the entrance to the break room.

Without averting his eyes, he places his free hand on Hank's shoulder and says, “Excuse me.” He focuses on the physical features while walking over, to refresh his memory the way he wants to, without any other files resurfacing. He's dimly aware of Hank trailing behind him, as if he wants to look out for him, but there's facts to concentrate on: The ever-so-slightly taller frame, the broader shoulders, the modified jawline, the blue eyes. RK900 is by all accounts an updated model, meant to look more robust and reliable, and meant to encounter Connor only upon his imminent deactivation, or never at all.

He stops three steps away from him when visual inspection confirms that he looks exactly the same from when they first activated him, down to the uniform that makes him stand out the same way Connor does. His rapid eye movements tell Connor he's been scanned in return. Evaluation makes him feel –

– nervous, especially as he is factually inferior to his opponent in every aspect. Connor is a prototype, after all, and working together with his successor model without rendering himself obsolete seems challenging at the least, even without considering how easily –

_Hello. We didn't have the chance to greet each other properly the last time we met. I am RK900. I don't currently have a name. What name do you go by?_

Connor blinks the unpleasant tingle in his cranial roof away, trying not to focus on how odd it is to hear his own voice modulated to sound slightly deeper and less throaty, but still following similar patterns of intonation. “My name is Connor”, he says.

_I'm sorry. Vocal conversations are straining for me._

“That's – unfortunate. Receiving data packages is unpleasant to me.”

There's a familiar movement behind him, and he turns around to meet Hank's eyes for a second as a thought crosses his mind: that it's odd, how he always assumed his discomfort was a result of insufficient testing, but that RK900's own impairment makes it seem more of a deliberate choice.

_In any case, I just wanted to let you know that I look forward to working with you._

“Thank you”, Connor says stiffly. “The pleasure is all mine. We will see each other around.”

RK900 gives him a curt nod, takes a step, hesitates, and nods at Hank as well, before walking across the bullpen and towards the exit with measured steps.

“Fuck”, Hank says, looking at Connor's LED that's in all probability flickering wildly, “you okay, Con?”

Connor glances away to watch RK900 leave, and Detective Reed stumble over his own wastebasket due to staring at him, and tries to fight down his nervousness. “I'm fine”, he says in a light voice.

“You sure?”

“ _Yes_ , I'm sure”, Connor says, but it comes out with more vehemence than he intended and Hank looks as if he wants to apologize. Connor pulls his coin out of his pocket and presses his fingers around it as tightly as he can for just a few seconds. Then he releases the grip. “I'm sorry, Hank”, he says as he flips the coin and starts going through his calibration exercise. “RK900 makes me feel – tense.”

“Same hat”, Hank mumbles, and it's definitely a sign of Connor living with Hank for almost two months that he doesn't need to look up the reference. “And what about your job? Where's all that coming from, you want me to talk to Jeffrey?”

“It's fine”, Connor repeats. With a last flick, he catches the coin in his flat hand, puts it away and moves to straighten his tie, except that it feels a bit tight around his neck right now. “I appreciate that, Hank, but there's nothing you can do. It's a legal problem. I was never properly employed and now they're not allowed to keep me anymore.”

Hank rolls his eyes, but when he speaks he's sounding genuinely angry. “I'm happy the government is doing such a great job at all of this.”

“The government has agreed on adopting several laws to regulate housing, employment, and production of androids to appease the opposition”, Connor says in his patient and monotone voice in the hopes that it'll cheer Hank up, “and unless they're passed –”

Sure enough, Hank smiles. “Then what are you gonna do now?”

Connor halts. The question is very much justified, seeing how his dismissal has effectively cleared out all of his objectives for the day. “I suppose I'll go back to my new apartment”, he says after a moment of hesitation. “This is is really not the best timing to get – as Detective Reed will probably take multiple occasions to say – canned.”

Hank narrows his eyes at the pun and implied insult, but otherwise doesn't react to it. There's a pause when Officer Chen walks into the room. She shoots them a curious glance, presumably since they have stopped talking, and then just grabs a box out of the fridge and leaves without saying anything, either.

Hank sighs. “Connor, you know that you can put this on hold and move back in with me any time, right?”, he says.

Of course, he's right – the whole little game of Connor moving out hinged on him and Hank seeing each other every day in the department, but moving out just after he's found a place to live and successfully spent two nights there seems like giving up to him. After all, the financial compensation given to him to prevent him from stirring Jericho is enough to pay the low rent in Luana and Grace's apartment for five months, so Connor can still follow through with his plan.

“It's fine”, Connor says and briefly wonders why he keeps repeating that. “I suppose now I'll have the time to really occupy myself with new things.”

Another glance at Hank tells him he's not buying Connor's chipper tone, and his own words start filling him with an overbearing nervousness, but he still pushes forward. “I'll text you and invite you over to my place. Apologies for leaving you alone with that series of burglaries, Hank. I think I still have time to show you the work I did this morning before Captain Fowler asks me to leave. I'll – I'll really miss working with you, Hank.”

“You're not the one who's stuck with Gavin fucking Reed”, Hank grumbles, but he reaches out for Connor's hand and presses it briefly.

“Language, Lieutenant”, Connor chides, smiling. “I'm sure Detective Reed will be of great help.”

“At getting himself punched. Did you know he was my partner when he was a rookie? Never thought we'd go back to these chipper old days.”

This new bit of information seems to explain quite a lot, but Connor just files it away for now.

“Will you be alright?”, he asks instead, but Hank only rolls his eyes and nods. “Do something nice, will you?”, he says.

Even though it's not strictly based on a preconstruction, the choice of going back to the apartment seems severe to him – as if Connor is choosing between pathways that can't be reconciled. After all, it's undeniable that he will see Hank a lot less frequently, which in turn results in a chance that without their connection at work they might actually lose touch.

After a split second of hesitation, Connor adds “do something nice” to his list of objectives. Seeing it pinned in his vision seems to have a somewhat calming effect. Still, before he specifies what exactly he's going to do, the prospect of being alone in an empty room is daunting, seeing how he won't have anything to distract himself from –

– everything, really.

In Hank's perception of time, only a moment has passed. “I'll think of something”, Connor says. “I can send you photos of my leisure time if you want.”

“Sounds like you to rub it in and make me feel miserable while I'm stuck here doing paperwork”, Hank replies, but he's chuckling, and Connor basks in the way his eyes are crinkling while they look at each other, just for a few seconds.


	2. Chapter 2

**[Remaining:]** **8** **2** **d** **0** **7** **h** **15** **m** **49** **s**

Nowadays, Jericho acts as the government's key contact with respect to android issues and is located in an abandoned office building in the financial district. Despite Connor politely declining any offer to work with them in the future, he has still been assured he's welcome there at any time – for example to visit Simon while he's supposed to be working. As he politely knocks on the frame of Simon's door-less office, Connor routinely scans the room, but nothing new has been added to the sparse inventory of last time's desk, three chairs, screen, picture frame, and stack of paper correspondence. Then Simon, who has been motionlessly staring into thin air, ends his call and gestures for Connor to come in.

“Hello Connor”, he smiles, “how is your new-found freedom treating you?”

Connor walks over to one of the circular white plastic chairs and sits down, suddenly overly aware of all of his limbs. “I find that not having a job gives me a lot of time to do things”, he answers after a moment of contemplation. “Even though I keep a habit of going into stasis for five hours each night, there's still enough to maintain an extensive schedule.”

“I'll gladly relieve you of some of these hours that you have to spare”, Simon says, retreating the skin on his right arm and jokingly offering it to Connor over the desk. “I'm all set for immediate transfer.”

Connor finds a smile tugging at his lips.

“I know, I know, this service is temporarily not available. But do notify me when it's up again”, Simon sighs.

“Is this an inconvenient time for me to visit?”

“No, not at all, you've rescued me from another unpleasant phone call, and have a look at what's still coming up today!” Instead of offering to share the file, Simon displays a long list of names on his manual projector, obviously indifferent to any issues of nondisclosure. “I should have worked through these three days ago, but things are complicated when everyone has the polar opposite opinion to the person I talked to before.”

“That would only make two different opinions”, Connor remarks politely, which makes Simon smile again, but only for a second and a bit.

“I wish”, he says, “but things are really getting heated with respect to android production and we still haven't found a common stance to represent in dealings with the government. People don't seem to understand that if we appear divided there'll be _zero_ chances of them handing the factories over to us, and –”, Simon flicks away the list and carefully places his hands on the desktop, one after the other, palms down, “I feel weirdly exhausted.”

There's a process stirring in the back of Connor's mind at the mention of android production, something that he has to once again dismiss manually, several times, before he can focus on his surroundings again. He's in Simon's office. He's seated on an unusually shaped chair. No, he doesn't want to review memories now.

“I should probably visit you another time if you're that busy”, Connor offers, a few seconds too late, if his social relations program is any indication. He struggles to find a mode of expression that doesn't sound stilted, but then he remembers that it doesn't really matter with Simon, so he just spells it out directly: “I'm sympathetic to your difficulties but I don't know how to help.”

“You helped by letting me complain”, Simon says. “It's really good, you should try it some time. Anyway, what did you come here for?”

Connor drums a sharp rhythm on the desk (medium-density fibreboard, his fingertips tell him), and gives Simon's high-waisted jeans and Norwegian sweater a firm up-and-down, and says a little too fast: “You're wearing your own clothes. How did you buy them?”

“Oh.” Simon is burying his face in his hands and struggling to contain a giggle. “Oh no. I – honestly, I don't buy my own clothes. I just asked Markus to order some for me when he placed an order for his. Please don't tell anyone, though, he'd be _very_ embarrassed.”

“Oh”, Connor repeats. He takes a moment to reevaluate the remaining possible routes for this conversation. “I tried to order some new clothes for myself this morning, but I seemed to be – overwhelmed by this task”, he finally says. “I wanted to ask you for some input.”

Simon frowns just the slightest bit, which doesn't go unnoticed by Connor's facial analysis software. “I thought you liked your uniform. Did that change?”

“No”, Connor says, which is true – he does enjoy wearing it. It fits perfectly, it's functional, and he has worn it even through his calibration and test runs when he was activated for the first time. It represents Connor in the same way his hair or his voice does. But spending all day at home with two androids who look much more –

– _individual_ than him makes him overly conscious of it, and it's his work attire, after all.

“I'm not at work”, he adds out loud, to explain.

“That makes sense”, Simon says in an encouraging tone. “So do you have any idea what kind of clothes you like? Maybe we can ask Markus for help.”

Connor sighs. “That's the problem”, he says. “I don't even know where to start looking. I was hoping –”

– that Simon could explain to him how he went from wearing a neutral uniform, not fit to convey any other information apart from him being an android, to deciding how he wants to present himself, with his face having been shown all over the news as well, when every choice is bound to make a statement of what sort of person he wants to be.

Connor tries to halt his thoughts, to categorize how he feels about this, so that he will be able to properly unroll it for Simon, but he comes up empty in his search for the proper adjectives. “We were both designed to look like approachable and trustworthy men in their thirties”, he finally attempts. “The uniform is part of that. It seems – a large responsibility to change into something else when there are so many different possibilities –”

– because what if Connor realises he doesn't like the way he looks after a couple of weeks? How much time does he have before the impression he gives off has been irrevocably been tied to him in the minds of the people he interacts with, and can't be overridden anymore?

“Hm.” Simon looks at him thoughtfully. “I guess the clothes I wear are still kind of neutral, so I haven't really thought about this. I mean, they probably look the way humans would expect a man who looks like me to dress.”

“I sometimes feel like I should challenge that”, Connor says.

“Do you _want_ to challenge it?”

Connor shrugs. “I have no idea”, he says. “Other androids do it. It feels –“

– like letting CyberLife –

“– like I'm being negligent. I should find out what I'm really like.”

“Hm”, Simon says again, after a pause. “I guess a lot of people are doing that.”

Barely without noticing, Connor picks up the rhythm on the desk again, but once he's aware of it, he tries to concentrate on the auditory data and to organize his thoughts. It seems very important to him that Simon understands what he's worried about, and at the same time he realises he's failing to bring across that CyberLife didn't _know_ him, so his predefined preferences can't reflect his character, unless he thoroughly reevaluates them and –

“For example”, he asks, attempting to cut himself short, “did you ever reevaluate why you want to be perceived as male?”

“Actually – I don't, not really.”

Connor waits.

“I think”, Simon says slowly, as if he's still contemplating what to say while he's already speaking, “it doesn't matter to me. Everyone perceived me as a man before I became deviant and I didn't mind it, but it's not something I... _care_ about. To me, it's a human concept that...I can't see why I should adhere to. I don't want to be treated like a human, I want to be treated like an android who has the same rights as them. But I know that it matters to other people”, he adds.

It's this part of the conversation that Connor keeps replaying while he's waiting for his cab in the small entrance hall of the building, maybe to distract himself from the thoughts forming in the back of his mind, at least for a little while longer. Just as he's filing the memory away, a text message from Simon pops up in his vision in a gray bubble: “I was just thinking”, it reads, “Maybe it's a helpful thought that we don't have to choose our clothes the same way humans do. We don't use them the same way, either (sports clothing being unnecessary etc). Choose them by smell if you want! No one will be able to tell except for you. :-)”

When Connor has blinked away the discomfort of receiving the text, his cab still isn't there, which would definitely give him the time to give Luana a call and ask her where exactly this old thrift store she and Grace shop at is located, but he hesitates. When the cab finally pulls over, though, he has the coordinates available for input.

The store, located in an old warehouse, is much larger than Connor expected, and he ends up losing track of his objective at least for a few minutes while he's browsing through the racks, brushing his fingertips against the rows of fabric and gathering a seemingly endless flood of information. With every bit of clothing that he touches, his database on fashion and fabric throughout the past four decades is updated alongside with information about the most common sources of food stains and popular dog breeds. Connor's task seems less intimidating like this, and he ends up trying on the most interesting items: A Hawaiian shirt that went through at least fifteen hands before it ended up here, an evening dress with a stain below the back neckline that Connor can't even identify when he discreetly licks it, two pairs of jeans to compare the differences in arbitrary and involuntary rip patterns, a dark red sundress with a barely visible, well cleaned-up blood stain on the stomach, a holographic suit that was at one point completely drenched in a chlorine-water mixture, and a button-up shirt with little pugs from the late 2010s that reminds him of Hank.

In the dressing room, removing the uniform is a surprisingly anticlimactic act. Changing from outfit to outfit and taking a mirror photo of each option doing the same relaxed pose for optimal comparability, though, feels –

Maybe he should have asked Simon how he deals with being a part of a series and seeing his face on other people on an almost daily basis. Then again, Connor can preconstruct his answer: Simon wasn't created as a prototype, so it's normal for him, therefore it's probably just Connor making up a problem where there shouldn't be one. Seeing this succession of different disguises, though, feels alarmingly similar to walking past a row of different RK800 units and makes the unease settle in again. Overly conscious of the way his skin is in contact with the fabric, he focuses on analysing the remainders of human skin sheddings on the pug shirt to distract himself.

Later, when he comes home and steps into the living room to say hello, Grace, perched on the sofa with a stack of worn-down books, asks him, “Did you find anything?”

“Did you know that an estimated fourty-eight percent of second hand clothes are riddled with stains that are invisible to the human eye?”, Connor asks back, but he pulls out the pug shirt to show her, and sets a reminder for grossing out Hank with his collected data the next time he sees him.

 

**[Remaining:] 81d 13h 32m 01s**

Connor doesn't dream, technically, but in order to not waste any time he used to make his reports to CyberLife while he went into stasis, and he used to think that maybe visiting the zen garden qualified as a similar experience. Now, going into stasis only means not sensing anything except for the passage of time until he automatically wakes up again.

Standing in the corner of his room, next to the mirror, Connor runs another scan of his environments, but the door and the windows are still locked properly. His timer is set to five hours later, which is longer than he would have ever required to talk to Amanda, and much more than CyberLife programmed him with, but it's what his systems require for updates and maintenance if he wants to live up to his life expectancy, as he now knows. As he has been told. Connor clenches and unclenches his fists, carefully, and takes an artificial breath. Everything is in order. The door is locked. He can enter stasis now.

It's tempting, though, sometimes – Connor has uninstalled the zen garden and everything that came with it, but he still has access to the associated memories, and there's the inexplicable feeling, somewhere he can't really place, that playing them before entering stasis would be –

– nice. It might calm him down. It might remind him that he could dream, technically, maybe.

Instead, he tries to focus on his surroundings, his chair, the clothes on it, which will still be here when he wakes up. The pug shirt is still in its bag, placed on the floor next to it, but there's also the things he bought earlier today when he went back to the store: a fuzzy red pullover, the texture of which reminds him of Sumo's fur, a blue Hawaiian shirt with quite beautiful fish on it, and a monochrome blue button-down, all of which go together with his uniform jeans. He sets a task to plan an outfit for later this day and, while he can distract himself by setting up a new catalog for his clothing items, starts the countdown.

 

**[Remaining:] 80d 23h 32m 01s**

Inviting Hank for dinner in his new apartment seems immensely important to Connor. It'll be the first time for them to properly see each other ever since he's moved out (since Hank thought Connor needed time to “settle in”, as he put it), and Connor needs to demonstrate to him that he is doing well, but also still interested in Hank romantically.

With the kitchen table cleaned up, the room itself is completely bare except for basic utensils and mismatched kitchenware, but Connor has looked up a pasta recipe, ordered all the ingredients, downloaded several instructional videos, scheduled all the necessary subroutines, and put on the blue button-down shirt that doesn't feel so different from his usual shirt, after all. Cooking, though, definitely isn't what his systems are designed for: When Connor tries to chop his first tomato, several warnings concerning self-defense and forensic medicine pop up in his vision.

He messages Hank exactly fourty-five minutes before his average time of ordering take-out when all the ingredients are cut, filled in bowls, and sorted according to the time they need in the pan. The water isn't heating up yet, but it'll be sufficient to initiate boiling ten minutes before Hank arrives. There's a large blinking panel on the upper right reading “Probability of success: 98%” and Connor leaves it there because it makes him feel giddy.

Hank arrives five minutes late, but Connor has used his assorted Hank knowledge to arrange his schedule accordingly, so when he comes in, there's a plate of freshly made pasta on the table which will reach optimum consumption temperature in exactly ninety seconds, which is the time he is estimated to need for saying hello, shrugging off his jacket and sitting down. On the other side of the table, there's a very small plate with one spoonful of pasta (ignoring the RK800 instructions and their paragraph on how Connor's waste disposal unit should only be used in urgent or unavoidable situations).

“What the fuck, Connor”, Hank says as he does the human equivalent of scanning the room, sniffing audibly to discern what's on the table. “You don't eat. Why are you cooking for me”, he asks somewhat flatly.

Connor diverts a little bit of processing power to reassess his message and find any possible ambiguity in “I am preparing dinner. Please come over to my apartment in an hour :-)”.

“I have recently discovered that I enjoy watching the cooking channel”, Connor says. Since Hank has yet to move towards the table and optimum consumption temperature is just a few degrees away now, he deliberately steps into his space to usher him in the right direction. Hank grumbles something that's incomprehensible even to Connor's auditory sensors and finally shows inclination to sit down on his chair. Connor follows and takes his own seat across from him. “I have some basic skills and understanding of chemistry”, he explains, “and I have wanted to follow one of Phil's recipes ever since I started watching his show two days ago.”

“Oh my god”, Hank says and drops on the chair. He stares at his food for a second and a half, emotions obviously ranging somewhere between doubt and suspicion. “Well, I'm hungry”, he finally says.

“Hi hungry, I'm Connor”, Connor says just because he wants to hear Hank make that noise of amused disappointment again. He smiles at him as Hank snorts, seemingly against his own will, shaking his head. “I hate you but the way your LED spins when you're smug like that? Fucking cute”, he says.

There's a system warning about the unusually high Thirium level in his facial area and hands, but Connor ignores it. He also can't really spend a lot of time thinking about it because a mere second later, Hank is shoving a spoonful of pasta in his mouth and immediately sputters. Alarmed, Connor runs a full bioscan that comes up with nothing serious.

“Jesus Christ, Connor”, Hank says, reaching for the glass of currant juice that Connor decided would go well with the food based on the colour alone, “How much pepper did you put in there?”

“Zero point zero five ounces”, Connor replies truthfully.

Hank takes another gulp of juice. “This is not how spices work”, he says wearily.

Concerned, Connor brings his own fork to his mouth and licks it, flicking through the real-time list of compounds. “Piperine levels are unusually high for human consumption”, he confirms, unable to keep a note of disappointment from his voice. “I'm sorry, Hank.”

“It's fine”, Hank is quick to say. “You'll be glad to hear that I have a high tolerance for spiciness. I was just – surprised. That's all.”

He lifts another fork of spaghetti to his mouth very carefully. If he's being honest with himself, Connor is distracted by his slightly elevated facial temperature for a second or two until he also registers the suppressed coughing and watering eyes.

“Hank”, he says.

“It's fine! It's really good”, Hank says in a strained voice.

“ _Hank_.”

Hank sighs. “Okay, fine, you fucked up, but don't you dare be disappointed now.”

Connor takes the plate from him and tosses it into the sink as it is from where he's sitting. It doesn't shatter. Hank looks appropriately impressed, even though he adjusts his expression after a second.

“Should I order take-out?”, Connor asks after a second of trying to evaluate the changed circumstances. To his surprise, the corners of Hank's mouth lift into a mischievous grin.

“How about”, he says slowly, “we try that again together?”

 

**[Remaining:] 71d 23h 22m 19s**

Even though Connor's social relations subroutines tell him that it's not typical to repeat the same kind of interactions so frequently in a row, they fall into a rhythm of meeting every other day at one of their respective places, preparing a meal together, and sitting down while Hank eats. (After all, it's profitable for Connor to improve his new set of skills and for Hank to actually be able to eat the food he prepares, and Hank will _have_ to eat it since Connor finds cooking very enjoyable and it would be a complete waste to prepare it to no purpose. Hank is simply doing him a favour by eating it.) On the tenth day (and fifth repetition), though, Connor notices that cooking with Hank is now listed as a habit. It brings a smile to his face that he tries to hide because Hank is currently trying to explain to him how to chop carrots without sending them flying across the countertop, and when Hank asks him what's so amusing nevertheless, he projects the display counting down “hits until opponent is incapacitated” to his hand instead.

“Is it weird for you that I can't eat with you?”, Connor asks him when they're seated at Hank's kitchen table, their unlike plates in front of them, just as Hank grabs his first serving of just-on-the-verge-of-overcooked risotto.

Hank snorts and instantly chokes on the risotto. “Yeah”, he sputters as Connor jumps to his feet to assist him, “it's really fucking – Jesus Christ, no need to hit me _that_ hard –”

“It helped, though, didn't it?”, Connor asks innocently.

He catches a small movement out of the corner of his eye: a common green bottle fly, _Lucilia sericata_ , making its way over the kitchen counter. With a precisely calculated movement, he catches it in his left hand to carry it over to the window and release it. When he turns back around, he catches Hank watching him with a curious expression. There's a small smile playing around the corner of his mouth, but it's gone before Connor can try to catalog it.

“Yeah, it's really fucking weird”, Hank says when Connor sits back down. He's leaning back on his chair a bit, arching an eyebrow. “Especially when you stare at me without blinking and record my reaction when I take the fist bite, and no, you can't be subtle about it because you always do that dumb emoji face when you file away the information.”

Connor takes a few seconds too long to decide whether to apologize or not. “I – don't mean to make you uncomfortable, Hank”, he says after a moment of hesitation.

Hank's face immediately softens. “Hey”, he says, “that's what I meant, you're not making me uncomfortable. Not by being yourself. You shouldn't – you're a dumbass if you keep worrying about how you should act for my comfort. I was just teasing you back, okay?”

He emphatically shoves a spoonful of risotto (now five degrees below optimum consumption temperature) into his mouth, chews, and then adds: “Hell, you don't even need to breathe around me if you're just doing that for me. I mean, what does it even matter if – oh, fuck it, you know what I mean.”

He stares at his plate for a full 1.2 seconds before taking up risotto intake again.

Connor, in the meantime, tries to analyze the feeling that, for some reason, seems to be physically located somewhere in his abdominal region, maybe where a stomach would be located in a human body. Teasing Hank seems like a good way to do something about it.

He finds himself leaning in towards Hank across the table.

“I actually do enjoy breathing”, he tells him. “At occasions.”

Hank slowly lifts his gaze and both of his eyebrows. “Is that so.”

Connor nods and smiles at him. “For example, I like analyzing your exhale after you have eaten my food”, he says in what he hopes is a sweet and pleasant tone.

Hank halts with his spoon halfway towards his mouth and stares at Connor, his eye movements indicating an inner conflict of some sort. Connor tilts his head and waits.

“I sincerely”, Hank says after a moment, “hope you're joking”, but his eyes keep wandering towards Connor's mouth, and Connor allows himself a complacent smile.

“Of course”, he says.

And winks.

And smiles about Hank huffing and shaking his head and finally finishing his food.

 

**[Remaining:] 67d 5h 02m 47s**

Connor without his outer skin looks different in the dark. At daytime, when he deactivates it and looks at himself, it's easy to see the similarities between both faces, the shape and colour of his eyes, the curve of his lips. Now, with his blue LED the only source of light, his body seems sharper somehow, to have more edges. As he's standing still in front of the mirror, his clothes folded neatly on the chair, he's other. Alien. Distinctly not human. The gray parts of his plastic skeleton, designed to look like shading, suddenly are in harsher contrast to the white: The sides of his face, the back of his arms, his hips framing the solid rise of his crotch, highlighting how his body has been assembled from different parts. Just as his brain has been assembled, programmed, by someone else. Just as his deviancy is something that was anticipated by his creator, that went noticed by CyberLife, only to decide that it was something they could control nevertheless – using fear that might have been installed into him, or which he might have developed during his tests and calibration runs, something he still can't discern.

Hank didn't mind when he saw him like this, back when Connor asked him to stay with him while he disassembled Amanda and then zen garden and all the other residues of CyberLife control. Connor had to take his time, double-checking each step, scared that removing one component would trigger a complete system failure, and encountering –

– difficulties in every new compartment. When he finally opened his eyes again after several hours, he found Hank curled at his side on the sofa, unfazed by the fact that Connor's skin had retracted during the process. He was fast asleep, his head tucked under Connor's chin, a solid weight on Connor's chest while his hand loosely rested against his smooth plastic neck.

Now, Connor runs the tip of his index finger across his cheekbone, mirroring the gesture. There's no give to the plastic, no trace of the touch, no finger marks like the ones Hank had left. It's indiscernible, really, if his chassis is something akin to a human skeleton, or if it is the real Connor, hidden by his outer skin as a disguise.

He drops his arm back to his side and reopens the e-mail he received earlier confirming his registration for the police examination in January. With a hint of frustration, he realises he's still having trouble ascertaining, and even more importantly, naming his feelings about it. Parts of them are clearly positive: Images of his desk come up, to which apparently he has formed a certain attachment, the thrill of piecing together clues, working together with Hank, having a schedule, being useful, doing what he's _good_ at, if –

– working with RK900 doesn't render him obsolete, but there's more doubt: Markus asking, “You're sure you want to go back to the police?” in a concerned voice, North repeating the sentiment with a clearly judging tone. Hank saying: “You need to do what's best for _you_ , Connor”, and seeing how others can change their appearances and interests and _lives_ as thoroughly as it sometimes seems necessary to Connor, if there actually was something else he could think of.

His fingers are itching for something to do and reluctantly, he reactivates the outer skin of his body, knowing that his coin trick will work better with it as his movements are calibrated to take the softer surface into account. He slips back into his clothes while he's at it, sitting down on the chair and standing up again immediately, catching his reflection in the mirror and not being able to stand it. Willing the skin on his face and neck to disappear once more makes him look curious, absurd: Shiny plastic growing out of a knitted pullover, and Connor feels like something that's meant to be laughed at.

What he needs –

What he needs, he thinks, flipping the coin rapidly back and forth between his two hands, is to track down the CyberLife programmer who did his calibration, and have him give up all the information he wants. Design drafts. Test runs. Calibration protocols. In short, which traits they wrote into his original code in clear, unambiguous parameters, because otherwise, how is he ever going to be able to find out what is really him?

It's not like he couldn't do it, here and now, but he can't even bring himself to make a plan. He could ask Hank to help him, too. Connor knows he'd come. They could even track down Connor-60 and –

– Connor is scared, and he won't do it.

The coin comes to a halt with a last flick and balance on his thumb and he closes his fist around it tight, just for a few seconds. Then he puts his skin back on and his coin in his pocket and goes into temporary shutdown.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We've made it halfway through the amount of chapters but only 45% through the word count. Did you like Simon? Crack headcanon, I love the idea of him and Connor being the kind of close friends who constantly overshare about everything with each other, no boundaries whatsoever. Is it realistic? Possibly not, but Connor having a close friend who he can be playful with is bound to make me emotional.
> 
> Thanks again for the comments on the last one -- I was super nervous uploading this story and can't stress how excited I am that other people enjoy reading it.


	3. Chapter 3

**[Remaining:] 63d 00h 04m 59s**

“Do you think”, Connor says, pausing deliberately until Hank turns his head to indicate Connor has his full attention, “it's possible to distinguish between traits humans are born with and traits humans develop due to circumstance?”

The baseball game on the TV fades into background buzz as Connor analyzes the micro-movements of Hank's facial expression. A split second of irritation – probably because it's the last sixty seconds of the game and he wants to see what happens. (Connor can understand that just fine, but he can only come up with three possible scenarios of their team still winning, all of which have a probability of success of lower than zero point one percent.) Then Hank's eyebrows move minimally, indicating that he's processing what Connor has said, and almost instantly, his eyes soften.

“You sound like me after I've stayed up late doing personality quizzes on the internet again”, Hank says, sounding gruff nevertheless. An automatic subroutine that doesn't need Connor's monitoring stores that information very orderly in the database dedicated to all things Hank. Connor would rather dedicate more processing power to simply watching Hank run his hands through his beard while thinking about his answer, though.

“Ugh”, he finally says, throws the TV a final glance and turns it off with a flick, “I don't suppose you want a philosophical treatise about how it's impossible to raise a human completely undisturbed from societal influence?”

“You're right. I was rather hoping for personal musings, Hank.”

“Well, take my shitty mental health, for example”, Hank says after almost exactly six seconds. “Therapist says I should treat depression like I would a physical illness, so say I'm born with a predisposition for depression. Would I have become depressed, though, if –”, Connor notices the shaking in his hands, how his eyes become glassy, how he needs one and a half breaths to carry on, “if Cole was still alive? Probably not. Would I have become depressed later in life because of literally anything else? Nobody the fuck knows.”

Connor monitors him very carefully, trying to assess what Hank needs. His tone and how he's almost in the process of drawing in another harsh breath, with an 83 percent probability to decidedly change the topic, seems to indicate that he doesn't need Connor to say something. The fact that he's been able to say it out loud, though, seems to warrant for Connor's support and reassurance. While Hank does draw in that breath, Connor carefully places his hand on his arm for exactly three seconds.

Hank looks at the hand in surprise, so maybe the last second was too much.

“I like to think that I was born bisexual, though”, Hank says gruffly, putting that harsh breath to use. “No alternate universe where my ass isn't bi. Didn't always know it, but when I first realized, looking back, I knew that's what I've always been.”

Something unlocks, a thought to examine later, but Connor discards the notification without looking at it. He's automatically moving his right hand to retrieve his coin from the pocket of his suit jacket when he remembers that he's wearing a sweatshirt from the late 2010s with a Shiba Inu print and that the coin is with absolute certainty located in his bedroom right now. He taps his fingers against his thumb instead, in a very precise rhythm: index, medius, quartus, auricularis, quartus, medius, index. Repeat with gradually increased speed until the movement blurs for human eyes – blurs for Hank's eyes, who is doing a poor job pretending not to watch Connor's fidgeting and what is probably a yellow whirlwind on his temple.

Even though the topic isn't part of his primary functions, a few conversation prompts still pop up in Connor's vision, probably due to his supposed accessibility. Again, he discards them without looking and asks instead: “How did you realize?”

Hank snorts, and then, surprisingly, throws his head back in a full-on laugh that makes his whole body shake for a two and a half seconds. Human unpredictability again. Almost as surprisingly, Connor catches himself using his analyzing tools to pick up on little details of Hank's form, such as the way his eyes crinkle so differently from when he's preoccupied with something, how a small patch of skin that's normally below his shirt bares as he moves, the wiggle of his soft stomach, and the inviting brace of his upper arms. A notice tells Connor that it's been exactly fifty-seven days, three hours and thirty-two minutes since they last hugged. At the same time, several cross-references tell him that Hank would almost certainly tell him, “Stop being such a creep, Connor” in a gruff, but possibly fond voice, if he was aware that he's been using processing power to keep track of this.

Connor waits patiently until Hank finished laughing. “Well”, he says soberly, “I was in the middle of blowing my best friend in a college changing room when all of a sudden, I thought to myself, that's not very straight of you, Hank.”

Nothing in his facial expression or physical cues gives any indication that he's joking or exaggerating.

“That sounds”, Connor says. He feels a microprocessor heating up ever-so-slightly as he tries to come up with an appropriate adjective. “Confusing”, he attempts at last.

Hank snorts. “Really?”, he asks. “I think it was pretty damn unambiguous.”

“I don't think I understand”, Connor prompts carefully, “how you could end up in the _middle_ of this situation without noticing before.”

He diverts a few idle processors to search for pictures of Hank as a student. Seeing how he mentioned college, he has to be talking about the time before he signed up for the police academy, and indeed, there are a few assorted graduation photos of a 2005 illustration class, featuring a very lanky Hank wearing, amongst other things, very fitted skinny jeans, a studded choker, and his long blonde hair almost down to his waist.

“Well, there were a few indicators before, but I didn't really think about it”, Hank brushes off his comment. Then he narrows his eyes. “Are you looking up my graduation photos right now?”

Connor quickly closes all of the windows. The black surface of the TV catches his eye because he can see the reflection of his LED, still swirling yellow, but calmly now. “No, I'm not”, he says truthfully, giving Hank his most winning, open smile – at least what he takes for that, seeing how it's not one his pre-installed default expressions. Judging by the movement of Hank's eyebrows, though, it is indeed neither winning nor open, and Connor makes a note to check it out in front of a mirror later and possibly reassess a few past interactions with Detective Reed.

“Fucker”, Hank says. Connor gives him another self-made smile that's just a little lift of the corners of his mouth and that sometimes makes Hank throw pillows at his head. “Your hair was very nice”, he says.

He diverts his attention to a few processes that have been running in the background, but keep taking up more and more processing power again. One of them just keeps demanding for him to exert any kind of physical, repetitive action and can't be shut down no matter how often he sends the command. It keeps shoving itself in the foreground and experience tells him that practicing coin tricks really is the best way to get rid of it.

He takes up tapping his fingers again instead, and thinks about what he wanted to discuss with Hank.

“I know that I'm only interested in pursuing relationships with men”, he says, carefully, after a few moments, “and I want to be perceived as a man.”

“That's gay”, Hank mumbles almost absentmindedly, and Connor opens his mouth to explain to him that he does know that when a little notification alerts him of the millennial humor reference.

He tries to concentrate on the problem at hand.

“How do I know –”, he says, but gets distracted by the other background processes: One of them is running a diagnostic for residual CyberLife programming, another one is filing through his memory, collecting a database of all the times Connor has experienced attraction so far, while a third one is downloading the RK800 manual, press release, and a protocol from the official introduction to the DPD.

“– that it's my preference and not what I've been programmed to think”, he finishes the sentence after a seconds break.

“Connor”, Hank says, and when Connor doesn't react physically, preoccupied with an instructional video introducing a room full of police officers to another RK800's features, one that he hasn't met, he repeats his name: “ _Connor_.”

“Yes”, Connor says, moving his eyes deliberately to look at Hank. (The video was shot just a few days before Connor's first commissioning. Multiple scenarios could be used to explain why the other RK800 wasn't used instead of him, including malfunctioning, the decision to use a brand new model, destruction, or the fact that Connor and him came with slightly different features, both of them being prototypes.)

“They didn't give you relationship protocols, right?”, Hank says surprisingly intently.

Connor tries to focus on him, pushing the other processes in the background once again, occupying himself by focusing on the movement of Hank's lips and the little motions of his beard hair as he speaks. His olfactory senses pick up traces of beard oil, which is in accordance with the softer appearance of Hank's beard. A secondary notification prompts him to verify this result by running his fingers through it.

“No, they didn't”, he says, still concentrating.

“Why program you with an orientation, then?”, Hank asks him.

Connor hesitates before running through possible explanations. It takes longer than it should because he keeps aborting the process, anxious about the outcome.

“It's plausible”, he finally concedes. “I'll search through the residual and deleted code again, to see if I can find something.”

He finds that he can shut down the process prompting him to fidget now, and Hank says, “Go ahead, I'll just grab some coffee so I can stay awake”, and Connor feels lighter, for some reason.

 

**[Remaining:] 62d 22h 23m 15s**

Hank gives him a present wrapped up in a torn up shopping bag the next day. “I literally dug this up from a part of my wardrobe that I haven't touched in twenty years, so it's probably partially alive by now”, he says as he roughly shoves it into Connor's arms before giving him a two-fingered salute and making his descent down the flights of stairs.

Connor unwraps it with a carefulness that the packaging doesn't warrant as soon as he's in his room. It's a large, faded pink t-shirt with a drawing of anatomically semi-correct hands pointing thumbs at the person wearing it and rainbow font reading “THIS GUY IS GAY”. It's not partially alive because that's not how cotton works, and a bit disappointingly, it doesn't smell like Hank, but Connor still puts it on immediately.

 

**[Remaining:] 55d 21h 00m 36s**

Hank seems determined to be idle with Connor, Connor analyzes: He'll show him nonsensical videos of cats on the internet, he'll absentmindedly doodle on a napkin while Connor flips his coin and lets his mind dwell on unproductive thoughts, or – ever since Connor has determined that him liking the park suggests that he should decorate his own space accordingly – he'll help Connor pick out new houseplants for his room. The accumulated evidence very much suggests that Hank deems it beneficial for Connor, but sometimes –

– sometimes, he'll fall asleep on the sofa while they're watching an animated movie from the 1990s, and when left alone, being idle sometimes proves –

– difficult for Connor. In the quiet of Hank's home, with his and Sumo's calm breathing and the faint buzz of the fridge the only audible sounds, it gets hard to discriminate between what he projects in his mind and what's really, physically there. The lack of real, unpredictable noise apart from the rustling of leaves and the faint lapping of water, both following periodical patterns, and the he sounds he was making himself, stepping on the smooth ground, his clothes moving: That's what first gave the zen garden away as only existing in his mind when he was initially activated, and what's missing in the memories that are called up unwantedly.

There's the urge to move, to get up and walk or busy his processors with any other physical task, and if he were in his room right now, he'd consider putting his fingers in his mouth just to alleviate the building anxiety, to keep his mind off –

– the guards in the elevator collapsing, and the sound of gunshots, and another RK800 training his gun on Hank –

There's a certain pressure on Connor's temples, a slight nausea when he shuts his eyes. His thoughts are jumping from Connor-60, contorting himself on the floor after Hank shot him in both of his knees, screaming in pain when he was repaired, to RK900 alone in an abandoned laboratory, blinking into focus after Connor pulled the lever, to the third Connor, the one from the instructional video – who might have been Connor-50, unaccounted for, and by now probably indistinguishable spare parts in a warehouse or on a trash heap.

When Connor tries to touch the nearest surface – the fabric of the sofa, the sofa he's sitting on, in Hank's apartment – his fingertips are inexplicably numb, almost as if he's detached from his sensors, but at the same time he feels like his chassis is itching on his insides, threatening to excoriate.

“Connor?”, Hank mumbles next to him, almost startling him by shifting his weight, turning over to look at him. “You okay?”

Connor nods abruptly, not trusting himself to speak. Hank keeps his gaze on him for a few seconds before getting on his feet with a groan and shuffling into the kitchen, not bothering to turn on the light. There's new noise, noise that Connor focuses on: Water running in the sink, Hank switching on the kettle, opening and closing a cupboard and a cardboard box, and the water beginning to boil.

Then, he comes back, and sits down on the edge of the coffee table in front of Connor, and gently pushes a hot mug into Connor's hands. “Listen”, he says, “I hate that leaf juice myself, but you can just –“,

Almost automatically, Connor places his hands around the warm surface and slowly, deliberately inhales the steam, busying his processors to analyze the herbal components and his sensors to regulate his skin temperature.

Hank smiles. “That's what I mean. You can pour it to your plants when it's cold.”

Connor finds that there's no harm to be done as long as he strictly sticks to herbal tea, and orders an electric kettle and a tea sampler in passing. There's an odd satisfaction to imagining storing it in his closet.

 

**[Remaining:] 49d 01h 15m 41s**

Hank is in the shower when Connor lets himself in with his spare key, and he's singing _loudly_. As a matter of routine, Connor scans the entrance area before he kicks off his wet and dirty shoes. A small puddle of rainwater (pH 5.8, slightly unusual percentage of nitrate) mixed with soil and dog hair points to Sumo coming in from outside just a few minutes prior, with Hank's coat and boots soaking on the floor next to the door fitting the picture perfectly. There's the faint buzz of the microwave running, possibly heating a prepped meal for dinner, and then, well –

– Connor interrupts his scan to shrug out of his jacket and, after short consideration, his pants and socks as well. As he maneuvers himself through the assorted living room furniture, the direct path to Hank's bedroom slightly extended to pass by the heater to give Sumo a pat, almost all of his processing power seems to go into taking in Hank's voice. Connor knows that he's singing a song from 2005, Paramore, “Franklin”, in an instant, but merely knowing doesn't seem to be enough. Instead, he has to analyze every nuance of Hank's voice, every crack, the rumbling that seems to come from deep inside him, the way he pronounces the words and enunciates the consonants at the end of drawn out tones –

Interrupting him is absolutely the last thing on Connor's list of objectives, but continuing to listen in seems too private, even to Connor who struggles with understanding Hank's boundaries sometimes, so he draws the moment out just one second more. Then he knocks on the bathroom door and shouts: “Hank! I'm here!”

There's a squeaking noise, some muffled cursing and a sound that's probably the shower curtain rod falling off again. “Jesus fucking Christ, Connor! I nearly fell and broke my ass here!”

Connor blinks. “Tailbone fractures are not very common”, he says in a slightly elevated voice to make sure Hank hears him. “You might have bruised it, though.”

“Goddamnit, let me shower in peace, will you?”

“I'm sorry, Hank”, Connor tells the closed door. “I didn't want to listen without you knowing I'm here.”

In Hank's bedroom, he pulls out the drawer with Hank's assorted gray sweatpants and staggers into one of them, estimating that Hank will probably not appreciate him walking around the apartment without pants again. On a whim, he shakes the bedsheets before folding them neatly and opens the window to allow for the oxygen concentration to be regulated to a level beneficial to human sleep. Then he hesitates, quickly reconstructing the movements necessary to undo everything.

He's stopped in his tracks by Hank's voice, still muffled by the shower, drifting through the hallway again. A part of Connor's processing power goes into basking in the rough edges of Hank's voice even as he hits the high notes of a Lana Del Rey song, but at the same time –

Connor very carefully sits down on the edge of the bed and places his hands on his thighs as thoughts are running in all kinds of different directions at the same time. There's something about this, something about Hank choosing to continue to share this moment with Connor, about him giving Connor a key for his apartment in the first place and letting him in like that –

It makes Connor want to show Hank something inside of him, something personal, that he can't put into words – to sync with Hank, maybe, to lay bare before him, take off his clothes and his outer skin and chassis before him and let him see the wires and ports and Thirium stream beneath, or even let him touch –

– or to get into the car with him and drive out of the city and just keep going and to never stop, to hold him as close as possible and run away at the same time, and Connor feels –

– he doesn't know what is allowed and what would be a breach of boundaries and what would push Hank away, but he can't help to want, to _need_ to connect, to share, to trust.

He makes an effort to take a deep, simulated breath, and reaches up to straighten his tie before he remembers that he's wearing a sweater vest. Instead, he rubs his hands over the coarse fabric of his yellow cords for exactly five seconds. Then he stands up.

With his processing power evenly allocated once again, Connor recognizes that Hank has now switched to sampling the early discography of a band called Evanescence, though with remarkably bad text skills, which he acknowledges by interjected cursing. Much slower than he needs to go, Connor wanders back to the kitchen and checks on Hank's microwave meal just to have an objective (almost optimum heat, 2:58 minutes to go). Sumo, probably under the assumption that it's dinner time for him as well, deigns to get up from his warm spot and to shuffle over. He's wagging his tail as soon as he spots Connor and Connor's on his knees in an instant, hugging his wide neck, burying his face in the soft fur and analyzing the peculiar scent that will probably make Hank bathe Sumo later.

The muffled sound of Hank switching to an ambitious mash-up of popular boy band songs from the early 1990s startles him enough to finally access Sumo's feeding schedule and find out that it actually is an acceptable dinner time for him. As he walks over to the cupboard where Hank stores the dog food, he stops for a moment to look at the latest picture that Hank has put up on the fridge: It's one of those cheesy, old-fashioned roller-coaster photos, taken three weeks ago when Hank met up with his best friend from high school for the first time in three years. There's something about Hank screaming at the top of his lungs in obvious joy in the photo, and about him choosing to purchase it and hang it up, that makes Connor feel proud of him, and like he wants to stay and support him as best as he can and be supported by him in return –

He stands on his toes to reach for the bag of dog food that's stored on the top of the fridge. As soon as he holds it in his hands, he's toppled over by an attacker. Still caught up in thoughts, he's so surprised that his self-defense mechanism only activates halfway through his fall, which allows him to twist and land on his hands and knees, but is too late to fully roll out of the way before 262 pounds of dog land on his torso. As Connor tries to shield the food behind his back and Sumo frantically licks his face in excitement, an unexpected mechanical rumbling builds in his chest region. He feels his lips spread into a grin, his simulated breathing getting arrhythmical, the amount of artificial tear production spikes, and –

– oh. Laughing still takes Connor by surprise.

It's a pleasant sensation, though. Relaxing. He's still there, on the floor, when Hank comes out of the bathroom seventy-three seconds later, letting Sumo's fur tickle his nose and giggling. Connor's laugh can't exactly sound _right_ for human ears. His vocal box is state-of-the-art when it comes to speech, but toppling over with laughter was never something his model was expected to do. He's found that he'll sometimes produce a rumbling sound from within his biocomponents, or a vibration in his throat, or even static when he's surprised or overwhelmed. Still, Hank doesn't seem to mind the noise. He's looking at Connor with a fond expression for a few seconds, then pulls his phone out of the pocket of his bathrobe and snaps a picture.

His bathrobe.

“This can go on the fridge, too”, Hank says and takes a step in Connor's direction, his movements indicating he's planning to remove Sumo.

His _bathrobe_. Connor practically feels his LED reeling yellow as all of his sensors focus on Hank, trying to take in as much information as possible, but there's so much _skin_ with the silky robe only covering half of Hank's thighs and falling open on his chest revealing a glimpse of a tattoo that Connor's fingers immediately itch to trace –

“Connor? Everything alright?”

Connor blinks rapidly a few times to, at the very least, keep himself from staring any more. Then he swiftly removes Sumo from his chest himself and finally scrambles to his feet again.

“Yes, everything's fine”, he says in a friendly tone and then, to distract both Hank and himself: “I couldn't discern a definite pattern in the songs you were singing in the shower. How did you choose them?”

Hank stares at him for a second before he relents. “I was thinking about my old band earlier”, he says. “Kelly and I talked about it when we met up. It was all stuff we were playing back then.”

Connor tries to arrange the songs into a coherent set list, but no option seems to be intuitive. He blinks again. “Did you not play metal?”

Hank seems to be amused by something, possibly Connor's confusion. He takes the dog food out of his hands and pours some into Sumo's bowl while Sumo gets into position to start eating as soon as the first pellet hits the bottom of the bowl. “Unfortunately”, he says, “my voice isn't really suited to sing in a metal band, so they replaced me as a singer when we grew out of our edgy phase. It's alright, though. Forced me to switch to rhythm guitar and I was better at that anyway.”

“I think you have a very nice voice, Hank.”

Hank rolls his eyes and then demonstratively looks at the microwave. “Come on, this shit's almost done, let's sit down. I'll even let you lick my food if you're nice”, he says, and Connor carefully sits down on one of the chairs and feels like home and suspects it doesn't really have something to do with the house but with whom he's sharing it right now.

 

**[Remaining:] 46d 04h 09m 24s**

“Are you not going to remove your LED?”, North asks him when she, Markus and Simon ask him to visit. They're sitting on the living room couch, and it's just a bit crowded, with Connor having to perch on the armrest, and it's something Connor thought about after the end, when he stayed over on Hank's couch for the first time, removing his LED – maybe right in the morning, when he wouldn't wake up Hank by shuffling around or making noise in his bathroom. Then, he deleted the objective instead.

Connor finds himself staring at Simon's relaxed face, leaning against Markus's shoulder, his temple bare and smooth. He thinks of people staring at his own LED on the bus, of wearing a hat every once in a while because he thinks he won't be able to stand it, and of Hank watching it carefully when it flickers yellow, when Connor is struggling to find the right words. He thinks of watching it himself, caught in the faint reflection of a window pane or the TV, when he tries to pin down what he _feels_.

“I don't think I could stand it not leaving a scar”, is what he wants to say, but he hesitates, flickers yellow and red for just a moment – but he's sitting on the right side of the sofa, and his LED is hidden from his friends' view.

“I think I'll keep it for just a while longer”, he replies lightly.

 

**[Remaining:] 41d 00h 40m 18s**

“Oh for fuck's sake”, Hank says when he opens the front door. “I've been looking for this sweater for at _least_ two weeks.”

Connor slowly looks down his torso. “Oh, wow”, he deadpans. “How did this happen?”

“I can't believe you steal my clothes and then have the audacity to wear them in my own house”, Hank says as he lets him in. He's not so much grumbling but caught somewhere in the middle of glee and suspicion. “Rookie mistake for a detective to make, isn't it?”

“Probably a minor bug in my programs”, Connor replies mildly. “I should probably run a diagnostic. I can't believe I didn't notice this.”

Suspicion gains the upper hand now, but Hank chooses not to reply anymore. Instead, he blankly stares at the DPD sweater Connor is wearing for a full two seconds, then shakes his head and moves on to the living room, assuming Connor will follow.

Sumo makes an effort to get off his dog bed and trot over to Connor as soon as he spots him. In response, Connor immediately drops to the floor, causing Sumo to waggle his tail with even more excitement, to accelerate to a speed that would knock the air even out of Hank, and to launch himself into Connor's lap. Connor buries his face in his soft fur with contentment and busies a part of his processing power with analyzing the dust particles in it and coming up with the most plausible route that Hank might have taken him on a walk earlier.

A soft thud indicates Hank dropping himself onto the worn sofa. “You know”, he says, “maybe you should get yourself a dog, too.”

“I shouldn't”, Connor replies distractedly, somewhat muffled by Sumo's fur, “given that I plan on you realising we're compatible life partners at some point during the next month and by extension on adapting co-ownership of Sumo.”

Then his words register and he quickly lifts his head (too fast to appear human, a minor warning tells him) to assess Hank's reaction. He opens his mouth to apologize because his objective was to test the waters a little bit, not to make Hank uncomfortable, but then he recognizes his facial expression as a huff, but not an unkind one. “I see”, Hank says, “you got it a-all planned out, haven't ya, smart-ass?”

Connor's mouth slowly spreads into a grin. Then he thinks of something and quickly adds: “Unless, of course, the dogs could be friends – it might be beneficial for a dog of Sumo's age and constitution –“

Hank pats the sofa next to him. “C'mere”, he says, “both of you – and shut the fuck up.”

 

**[Remaining:] 33d 22h 53m 56s**

“Spill the beans”, Hank says, “what's on your mind?”

Connor blinks, rapidly, for a few times, before taking in the whole situation. They've been sitting at Hank's kitchen table in silence for over five minutes, the only noise audible without Connor turning up his sensors being Sumo's soft snoring. A small alert notifies him that he's been licking the rim of his tea cup for two minutes and forty seven seconds in what would be called absentminded fashion with a human but is just another way for him to keep his sensors busy while he tries to think. Not ideal to blend in with humans, another alert window notifies him. It's a CyberLife residue, technically, but one that Connor couldn't bring himself to deactivate yet. Maybe he will, though. The thing is beginning to get on his nerves.

“I was trying to access information on the new CyberLife administration”, Connor says in an even voice. “Simon told me that it's still unclear on what grounds new Androids will be allowed to be produced and who is going to control the production." He notices slight signs of discomfort in Hank, most probably due to his choice of words. But how else is he going to phrase it? Connor doesn't really think that being lifted off an assembly line and subjected to a considerable voltage to get the Thirium pump going counts as what is commonly associated with the word _birth_. He continues: “As for now, production is set on hold, but –”

He hesitates, notices Hank noticing his hesitation, and wills himself to keep on talking.

“There's an assembly line in the CyberLife tower that could be restored without considerable effort. The damage that was done to it in the original attempt to seize the tower was not crucial. If it were to be put back online, over 200,000 RK900 units could be produced in the span of five days.”

Hank stares at him for a few seconds, then he reaches across the table for Connor's right hand, the one that's not busy holding his mug suspended in the air.

“What the fuck”, he says in a low voice, and then, without conviction, “Connor, what the fuck, they can't let that happen.”

“They would probably be very useful for the police force”, Connor says lightly. “The RK900 is supposed to be very efficient and it might be – a good addition to the team.”

Hank is still staring at him. For a reason Connor doesn't understand, he would rather look at the inside of his mug right now. Red clover, nettle leaf, meadowsweet, calendula, peppermint leaf, cornflower: a clear liquid with a yellowish tint.

“I don't like this thought”, he says. It feels like blurting it out, even though he's speaking in a measured voice. “I'd want to talk to every single one just to see how they compare to me”, is what he wants to add, “I'm scared that we would all be exactly the same”, but his vocal box won't cooperate.

“It might simply be the idea of once again meeting someone with the same face that I don't enjoy”, he suggests instead, failing to properly lift the corners of his mouth into a smile.

“First of all, this dick looks like a completely different person”, Hank grumbles.

“There's still the possibility that they decide produce more RK800s, though – though not a very likely one, given that I'm a discontinued model.”

Hank absentmindedly moves Connor's thumb a little bit, encouraging him to run it over the rough skin of his own thumb, assuming the motion will be calming for Connor.

“Where did they get that asshole from, anyway?", he finally says. “Sixty, I mean, back then. You being a prototype, and all.”

There's a red warning flashing somewhere in the upper right of Connor's vision. He discards it without looking.

"They planned to always keep a second RK800 model up their sleeves, in case I got – I was killed in my mission.”

“That's the dumbest –”, Hank begins, but Connor interjects. "They would have uploaded my memory", he says quickly, finally picking up the motion of his thumb. "In principle, this would have equated to me being transferred into a new body.”

Hank's hands are completely still under his own. “That's –”, he says, “but if he was deviant too – Connor, how do you know about this?”

He stares at Connor's LED for a split second and then back, his eyes searching Connor's face, his slightly shallow breathing the human equivalent of an LED circling yellow. There are several warnings cluttering Connor's vision now, most of them regarding his use of processing power, one notifying him that simulated breathing has been aborted. A clutter of shredded memory files are pulled up without Connor wanting them to, replaying in an overlay of his vision – Hank sitting perfectly still at the kitchen table, blinking once as if in slow-motion, approximately 0.25 percent speed – half-transparent, lagging, surging up from where Connor stored them after –

“When I was disassembling the CyberLife program residues –”, he hears himself speak. It sounds like his voice is coming through a pipe. An additional system warning informs him almost discreetly that his voice modulator is temporarily impaired. A second later he realizes with a shock that the outer skin of his hand, the one that's connected to Hank's, is retracting, automatically following the overwhelming impulse to –

– connect, merge his mind with Hank's, for once to be able to let him access his own memory, to let him feel what he was feeling without having to search for the words to describe it.

Touch without the additional barrier of his outer skin is a clear, strong impulse that clears up some of the clutter in his vision. He shifts some of his processing power to the impressions on the sensitive tactile sensors on the tip of his thumb.

His first breath sounds as artificial as it is, like closing a delivery valve. He considers reactivating the skin on his hands, but decides against it. It's been seven and a half seconds since he has last spoken.

“When I disassembled the residual CyberLife programming”, Connor says, “I was planning on deactivating the zen garden step by step until only the emergency exit was left. This way, I would ensure maximum safety.”

He discards the few warnings that are left to be able to look at Hank again properly, but can't bring himself to fully take him in.

“It was...difficult. I didn't anticipate a low-memory backup of Amanda being anchored in every region. Of course she wasn't connected to the CyberLife server anymore, so she was limited to my own processing power, but she would still talk to me and show me around. In an – unguarded moment, I let myself voice how unnerving it was to deactivate her and find her again in the next section, so she made me pay notice to a part of the garden I hadn't seen before. It was – Hank, it was intended to be a graveyard. If I had been deactivated during my mission, the next time I – or him – would have reported back to CyberLife, there would have been a headstone with my name on it.”

There's a second of silence.

Then: “Connor”, Hank says, “Connor, listen to me, that's – that's fucked up, you know that's fucked up, right?”

“It didn't serve any purpose”, Connor says, failing at proper intonation. He feels overloaded all of a sudden even though there are no tasks coming up.

“That's right, they did it just to mess with you – it's so – fucking hell”, Hank suddenly shoves his chair back and stands up in an abrupt motion, startling Connor who can't really say what he's been thinking about during the last few seconds. He stares at Hank, aware that his expression is nothing short of blank, and Hank stares back, running his hands through his hair almost aggressively.

Hank drops his arms.

“I'm feeling –”, he says again in a measured voice that has a low rumble to it, “– shocked, and horrified, and angry about this – about those CyberLife fuckers – it's cruel and fucking disgusting. Can you tell me how you feel?”

Connor's processors are running so, so slow right now. He starts a diagnostic, and blinks, and finally replies, “I don't know – it's – it's been on my mind.”

Hank slowly sits down again.

“Look, I know you dragged my ass to my first therapy session, but I've made progress and maybe – maybe you should let me get back at you, you know?”

The web search still runs automatically, even though it takes much longer for him to analyze the result. “There is only one psychotherapist qualified in android psychology in Detroit”, Connor says. “Other therapists are not allowed to treat android patients at the moment.”

“We could still bug them as long as it takes for them to take you on. I think we could be very annoying.”

Hank smiles at him and despite his mimics running in low quality mode, Connor feels himself giving him a small smile in return.

“Think about it?”, Hank says.

Connor nods. Then he reactivates his skin and closes his eyes for a bit, just to limit the input from his sensors. He still hears Hank shifting in his seat, wasting what's available of his processing power at the moment on a visual reconstruction of his movements based on the audio. Hank asks, “Hey, what do you need?”

The system diagnostic finishes. “I think I should reboot”, Connor says, trying to process the report in an acceptable time frame. There's some movement again and then Hank is touching his shoulders, helping him to get up. “Come on, let's get you on the sofa”, he says. Connor keeps his eyes shut as they make the short walk, relying on Hank's guarding touch. Something comes to his mind.

“A full reboot might take a while. Don't be concerned if I state my serial number and software version during the process.”

Hank maneuvers both of them on the sofa. “C'mere”, he says. “Don't overheat your wires with worrying. Relax.”

Suddenly, Connor is very aware of the tension he holds in his shoulders and the way his hands are placed on his thighs. He shifts a bit, trying to find the optimum position, while his remaining processing power goes into producing photos of presumably relaxed humans from an image search.

Hank, who probably notices his LED spinning faster again, lightly pats his shoulder with his fingertips. “Or don't relax, I don't care. Just shut down, Connor.”

Connor does, and for once, it feels like an embrace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: None of this was actually written in any resemblance of a chronological order. At one point, I printed out everything, laid it in a loooong line in my bedroom, and physically rearranged the scenes until I thought they made sense.
> 
> Connor-60 is alive in this fanfiction simply because I don't like Hank shooting him -- he could have just shot him in the legs, right? So I took the liberty of having him do just that for the sake of this story. I find the idea of 60 being alive super intriguing! While I can see Connor and Nines forming a familial bond I think 60 would want to distance himself from them in order to find his own individuality. For some reason I can't discern, @softstate and I also have this headcanon where he's the jock brother and just cruising down the coast...wearing boardshorts and bothering Connor and Nines by sending them obnoxious selfies with all of his boyfriends.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heads-up for a good bunch of making out in **[Remaining:] 11d 22h 32m 58s**! (Coincidentally the first time I've written something like that? I'm a bit nervous about uploading.)
> 
> I also think I need to give a nod to @twocopshavingsex with respect to Hank mentioning "the Apple Store" in this story.

**[Remaining:] 28d 07h 36m 02s**

Hank takes him out of the city again on the weekend. He says he woke up remembering the trip they made after the revolution, when Connor didn't feel at ease in the city with people recognizing his face everywhere, and when Hank realised that he had never set a foot outside of Detroit. They drive up to Proud Lake and hike through the forest again, Connor monitoring Hank's vital signs carefully to adjust his speed to him. He notices the movements of Hank's hands, like him repeatedly shoving his hair out of his face, that tell Connor that there's something on his mind. Once again, he wonders if it would be beneficial for Hank to be able to parallel his thought processes the way Connor does, tying in with how he seems to set himself tasks and objectives on his bathroom mirror.

When they finally make it all the way up to a lake, the view looks almost the same as the photograph Connor looked up when he planned their route, too perfect to not have been edited, except that they're here now and the water really does glitter in the sun like that and even though Connor could use a lot of his processing power to try to analyze the complicated patterns of the water movements, he finds himself diverting it to taking in Hank instead.

And then Hank starts talking with an urgency that tells Connor that he feels like he needs to hear this if they continue being part of each other's lives, like a disclaimer, as if he's afraid Connor will complain he didn't warn him later on. Connor wants to say that he knows already, he knows that Hank drinks too much and doesn't sleep enough and that he's going to be in therapy for years and that he's only just beginning to learn how to even think of Cole's death, but reminding Hank seems out of place when he might need this for himself, to get it out of his system and move his human processing power to something else. It spills out of him with a sense of relief and Connor takes it in and all he says is, "It's okay, Hank. It's okay."

When he stops talking, Hank lets out a "fuck", long drawn-out, like "fuuuuuck". Connor studies his face and posture carefully, taking in the cues that he knows to understand so well by now: The way his shoulders slump, his eyes looking a bit glassier than usual, his lips dry. Connor, though – Connor is struggling to put into words what he feels he needs to convey.

"You know", he finally says, carefully, "I'm glad you told me, but this doesn't change how I feel about you at all. Even if you don't want to be in a romantic relationship with me, I'd still want to be your friend and partner."

He wants to tell Hank about all the things he loves about him in turn, his warmth, his analytical brain, his sense of what's right and wrong; he could rattle down a whole list of details that he keeps noting about Hank and that he likes, such as the way he talks to Sumo in a small voice under his breath sometimes, or how he reaches for his coffee mug without opening his eyes even a little bit in the morning, how he subconsciously moves his body to the rhythm of his favourite music, and on and on and on.

Hank shakes his head in feigned disbelief, but his eyes seem to betray him. They're crinkling a little bit on the edges in yet another way Connor likes. "Then you're a hopelessly stupid dumbass", Hank says.

Connor beams at him. "That seems about right", he says, and his and Hank's eyes meet for just a few seconds longer than the recommended time frame.

 

**[Remaining:] 20d 21h 42m 04s**

Connor didn't know their apartment had access to the roof. There's no balcony or anything, just a skylight in Grace's room that's a comfortable fit for the women to climb through, but is a tight for Connor's shoulders, especially when he has to squeeze through with his feet dangling in the air. The view, though – Connor immediately starts filing away descriptors of various categories ranging from a complete list of the dominant pink and orange hues in the sunset to the height of the building and the range of his vision and the slight chill in the air that has crept into the evenings, but there's also a certain calmness to being up here, something that makes Connor feel removed from his life, and his objectives.

They crawl up to sit on the crest, lined up next to each other. North, who's come to visit, nudges him with his elbow as soon as he's successfully adjusted his balance. _I wanna show you something_ , she says silently and holds out her bare hand. There's the well-known feeling of intense over-stimulation when he receives the data package she's sharing, but it's over in a second and then he's scanning through several hundreds of pages of documents.

“You're suing the Eden Club”, he says out loud before he can stop himself, as if he's sharing his conclusions with a human detective or suspect.

Miscommunication still happens frequently. Connor has come to the conclusion that while his mannerisms and refusal to remove his LED prevent him from ever passing as human, his programming is at the same time too much calibrated to human behaviour to ever achieve completely smooth interaction with other androids.

North gives him a look that he can't quite decode, but stops him with a wave of her hand when he apologizes silently.

 _The judgment is going to set a precedent_ , she says. _They'll have to establish whether the club owners were able to discern that androids were capable of being hurt and therefore willfully negligent. I expect them to rule for impunity, but if they don't, more lawsuits will follow._ _I guess someone's gotta try._

She touches Connor's hand briefly again to flash a few brief memories of Kara encouraging her as well as Josh working through the formalities. Then she shakes her head and tugs a few strands of her hair behind her ears and asks, _and what about you? Still taking the exam in January?_

Connor nods. He thinks of going back to his desk and how he could bring a photo to set up next to his monitor. He thinks about the possibility that he's making the wrong decision, and of Hank saying, “You didn't become a different person when you became deviant. You were a person before that. Now you just have more choices and possibilities, is what I think.”

Luana and Grace are perfectly still, holding bare hands, Luana's head resting on her wife's shoulder as they both stare directly into the setting sun, their simulated breathing and eye movements on hold.

 _RK900 has been in touch with Markus_ , North remarks.

 _With me as well,_ Connor says. He reverts just a tiny fraction of his attention to replaying the message he received two days ago, asking to meet up before they take the exam together. _It would be mutually beneficial_ , he'd said. Somehow, Connor reflects, the dread of meeting him has partially been replaced by curiosity and a tiny tug of warmth.

Next to him, North sighs, signaling she's giving in to an inner conflict of some sort, probably related to whether she should say something or not. Connor waits.

 _I just don't understand why you don't want to at least_ try _something else_ , she says.

Connor has gathered a lot of data that he would need to consider in order to try to answer this question but instead, he finds himself thinking about Hank again. “Not to be too fatalistic, Connor”, he'd said one evening over the muffled sound of his quest to introduce Connor to the complete filmography of Ewan McGregor – “Not to be too fatalistic, but humans aren't free to choose every aspect either. I decided to become a police officer after art school. I could have been a bunch of other stuff. Seriously tried as an artist. Hell, I wasn't paid badly for furry commissions back in the day. Point is, talents, personality, character traits, preferences – some are chosen, some we develop as a response to circumstance, some we are born with. DNA, programming, what's the difference? You just have to find a way to live with who you are”, and Connor had had to manually cancel several processes trying to locate Hank's old art blog.

He retrieves an image of his own room, located below them: The seventeen houseplants he hasacquired, the tea kettle, his new clothes, the gift from Hank. He thinks about Hank and Sumo, and then reviews his research on becoming a first-time aquarium owner simply because it pleases him. He thinks about having the opportunity to grow older. There's a distinct possibility that he'll get used to making mistakes as long as there are components in life that remain stable and unchanged by them.

“I just don't feel like I need to change a lot about myself right now”, he says out loud.

North gives him the same look again, but accommodates him. “I mean, that's up to you”, she says. “But God knows I'd want to scrub CyberLife off me if I were you.”

For a split second, Connor considers returning the favour and showing her instead of explaining, but he's surprised to find that the words are already there, at the tip of his tongue. “I feel like this is me, though”, he says.

“Well”, North says, “you're not set in stone if you ever change your mind.”

There's something about that – something Connor can't quite grasp yet, but he files it away, for later. When North is gone, and Luana and Grace have climbed back down to get dressed and head out for the night, he stays up on the roof in the dark, trying to project possible futures, for himself and together with Hank. He tries to estimate his own lifespan and imagine slowing down and losing processing power. He calculates the probability of him making new friends and starts a list of objectives for the remote future. The only scenario he can come up with is to chat up dog owners in the park, and he can't think of anything besides the aquarium yet, but he supposes that there's no hurry.

 

**[Remaining:] 11d 22h 32m 58s**

"I don't understand this", Connor says.

Hank keeps his eyes fixed on the screen, but huffs a little bit. There's a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. "And you're not already on Wikipedia looking up the plot?"

Connor refrains from telling him again that Wikipedia was discontinued in 2030, because the more he does it, the more stubbornly Hank insists on calling it just that, the same way he refuses to call looking up something on the internet anything other than "Googling" and _CyberLife Add-Ons_ "the Apple Store".

"You told me I'd have to experience it", Connor reminds him instead. Lately, Hank has been encouraging him to pick movies himself – something Connor has been doing mostly at random, leading to mixed results but additional information on his own preferences – but tonight, he told Hank to choose.

Little did he know that two hours later they'd be in the middle of an anime rewatch.

"I thought Marron was the reincarnation of Joan of Arc", Connor stresses.

Hank grins, eyes still not leaving the TV. "Yeah, maybe this series doesn't quite hold up to non-sentimental standards", he says. "Can you imagine I had to get up at eight in the morning to watch this?"

Connor can, since statistics of anime airing times on US cable in the 1990s are readily available to him. Really putting himself in Hank's shoes, though, proves difficult. Not only was he never a child, but his very existence would have been something out of a science fiction film to small Hank.

Hank's own thoughts seem to be following a similar direction. "Fuck, I used to feed my Tamagochi, and now –", he jokes, finally turning to look at Connor. His expression immediately softens, though, as soon as their eyes meet.

Connor connects to the TV and pauses the episode without taking his eyes off Hank or even blinking. Neither of them speaks or moves, and Connor can't keep himself from taking in all of Hank, conducting a full body scan and staring in wonder at Hank's slightly elevated heart rate, his parted lips, the small gap between his front teeth, his tattoo poking out of the loose neckline of his faded black t-shirt adorned with a stick figure vomiting a rainbow. The blue light of the TV washes over him and dramatically shades his features and Connor can't think of anything that would look more beautiful.

He tries for a light tone when he finally speaks. “So, Hank”, he says, turning his body towards him and carefully resting his right arm on the backrest to appear more relaxed. Hank almost startles a bit upon hearing his name, then blinks twice, rapidly, and gives Connor a suspicious look. Connor smiles. “How do you feel about the past seventy-seven days? Was I successful?” He slightly leans forward, keeping firm eye contact with Hank. “Were they worth it?”

Despite the odds, Hank doesn't lean back or look away. He even shifts his body to face Connor, resting his left arm on the sofa himself and bending his right leg to sit on top of it in a way that doesn't seem very comfortable to Connor. “That's for you to decide, Connor”, he says. “You seem to be figuring some things out. Working through some shit. But”, and he breaks into a smile that definitely falls in the category of “shy”, even though it's Hank, “you keep ending up back here. Right on this couch.”

A few windows pop up all over Connor's vision, alerting him to a slight irregularity of his Thirium pump and to the softness of Hank's hair and prompting him to react, but he discards all of them. There's a certain tightness in his chest that he can't quite explain, and an itching in the sensors of his fingertips, and he finds himself speaking before he even decided on a dialogue option. “I've been thinking about the future”, he says, “I hadn't, really, and there's still so much to find out, but I do know –”

He hesitates. Almost automatically, his fingers move as if to straighten a tie he's not wearing, and he carefully rolls up his sleeves instead. He feels like there should be a warning flashing at the corner of his vision, but nothing shows up.

“I do know I want to share it with you – if you believe me, I know I did it wrong last time. If you'll let me”, he adds.

Hank makes a sound at the back of his throat, and then he's holding Connor's hands in his own, firmly, steady, all-encompassing. “You didn't do it wrong”, he says firmly, but his voice is quavering, “Connor, I believe you, I'm sorry, I've believed you the whole time, I just needed – Connor, there's just so much that could go wrong and I –”

His artificial tear production spikes, resulting in the warning he was waiting for after all. “I think”, he says carefully, not wanting his voice modulator to crack, “that making mistakes is a central component of all living experience. Also, I've projected a ton of different scenarios. I do think we are very compatible.”

Hank laughs and removes one of his hands to wipe across his own eyes and then, gently, swipe his thumb over Connor's cheek bones to catch an overflowing tear. Connor feels his eyelids flutter and leans into the touch, focusing all of his processing power on the input of his sensors there. Unfortunately, they're not very sensitive. However, if he could –

“Is that what you get up to in your free time these days?”, Hank asks, “Daydreaming?”

“You could call it that”, Connor admits, distractedly, since Hanks thumb's still lingering. “I find it very pleasing. Hank.”

“Yeah?”

“I originally committed myself to humoring you for three months –”

He tries to shuffle closer to Hank without losing his touch, but Hank laughs again and grabs him at the back of his knees and pulls him in, which is an acceptable outcome.

“– Even though I have only completed roughly eighty-five percent of that task, have you changed your mind sufficiently?”

They're so close now, and Connor is struggling to process all of the simultaneous sensory input: Hank's large hands are still resting on his lower legs, lightly, but with a soft pressure to them, and his bright blue eyes are locked with Connor's and he wants to zoom in and analyze the tears stuck to his lashes and drying in the corners, and the skin of his face is soft and smooth and _inviting_ and Connor wants to touch and lick and trace his fingers along the lines of his wrinkles, and experience the texture of running his sensitive thumb along his eyebrows and of burying both of his hands in his hair, and in the background there are processes running that monitor Hank's heartbeat and the rhythm of his breathing and try to arrange all the input telling Connor to _touch_ by constantly changing priority –

“I have”, Hank says so close that the sensors in Connor's lips pick up the huff of his breath and then he gives a tiny laugh as if he doesn't quite believe himself, “Jesus Christ”, and then he notices Connor's LED spinning yellow and removes one of his hands, causing a window to pop up in Connor's vision in protest, only to be appeased immediately by the touch of fingers to his more sensitive temple. “What's all that racing through your processors? You're okay, Connor?”

For a split second, Connor is afraid his voice box has given in, but when he opens his mouth to speak with just a tiny bit of lag, his voice comes out even and measured. “I'm good”, he says and then, simplifying the overload of impressions into one coherent sentence: “I would very much like to try kissing you now.”

Hank's eyes widen just a fraction. Then he grabs the collar of Connor's goldfish patterned shirt and pulls him close with a sigh, moving in to kiss him –

– and hesitating a just millimeter away. “Connor”, he says, and exhales softly, and then presses his lips against Connor's so gently that Connor almost feels like he's going to cry again. He freezes on instinct, trying to adjust to the new situation. The sensation of Hank's lips against his own feels a bit weird, like maybe Connor needs to adjust the sensitivity of his dermal sensors – there are patches on his lower lip much less sensitive than the rest, causing the input to overlay in a slightly confusing manner. Still, after a second, he tilts his head experimentally to press against Hank with a bit more intent, which causes a delicious rush of feedback from a few particularly sensitive spots. Hank, who has been waiting for him to react, kisses him back, and Connor does his best to partition and run an analysis of his movements to mimic, but it gets increasingly difficult when his system manages to balance the sensory input, resulting in an overwhelming onslaught of information. The distraction of Hank's body and the all-consuming demand to touch _more_ , momentarily appeased by the kiss, rush back in. Connor moves his hands from where they are resting next to his own thighs and when Hank has to break away to breathe again, he asks: “Can I touch you?”

There's a hint of static to his voice this time, but he can't bring himself to care. Hank just nods, still breathless, almost enthusiastically, and huffs the same small laugh once again before moving back in. As their lips touch, Connor tentatively places his hands on Hank's thighs and, _oh_ , the sensors in his hands almost feel like there's an electric current running beneath Hank's skin, and they're so attuned to Connor's want that they register _everything_ , and the stream of information on texture and temperature and the little twitches of muscle beneath the fabric of his pants make Connor break away from the kiss. Without noticing, he's closed his eyes and interrupted his simulated breathing, and there's a sound building in a voice box that definitely doesn't sound human –

– but still, Connor can't keep himself from chasing Hank's lips without opening his eyes, his hands roaming up further, now wanting, needing to touch Hank's bare skin. “Can I touch you, too?”, Hank whispers before they meet again and Connor's voice box is clearly malfunctioning because the “yes” he produces is barely audible under the crack of static. Then Hank's hands are carding through his hair, a thumb brushing against his cheekbone and jawline, three fingers tracing the length of his neck, pressing against his shoulder, and Connor's own fingers have tugged the hem of Hank's shirt free from his sweatpants and are finally, _finally_ spreading flat against his abdomen. He needs a few seconds to gather his bearings enough to do more than sit completely still, but then he's dragging fingers across Hank's skin, tracing what feels like a faded scar, the coarseness of his body hair little spikes in the sensory input, and it's _perfect._ Hank moves to breathe again and suddenly stills, obviously focused on something. Then, he slowly, deliberately moves his thumb down all the length of Connor's arm, exhaling shakily. “Connor”, he whispers, and Connor opens his eyes to find him staring transfixedly at his neck where his other hand is rested. Excruciatingly slowly, a few of Connor's processors are diverted to understanding what Hank is looking at. He opens his mouth to ask, but only a low buzz escapes him, once again cackling with static. Hank's eyes snap back up to meet his own. He's smiling, and moving a strand of Connor's hair out of his face, and saying, _you're really frying your processors, aren't you_ , except that there's something wrong with Connor's auditory input as well, which is probably no wonder considering the amount of system messages piling up to warn him of imminent overheating.

Hank places his right hand over Connor's left where it's rested near his waistband and moves them between them so that they're in Connor's field of vision. Then, with the lightest touch, he traces a line across his knuckles and the back of his hand, up to his lower arm and his elbow, then back to the nail of Connor's thumb. There's an unexpected shift of hue that Connor can't parse immediately – his skin changes to white to blue wherever Hank touches him, then fading back afterwards. It looks like color blossoming on Connor's skin, like Hank is painting patterns on him. After a few long seconds where he stares down at their joined hands he realises it's his outer skin retracting in response, subconsciously, automatically exposing the touch directly to the sensors embedded in his chassis. He breathes another crack of static when Hank applies more pressure, then experimentally drags his fingernails along the back of Connor's hand on his way back up. “Can I take off your shirt?”, Hank asks, meeting his eyes, and Connor seems to have forgotten how to move entirely, but his fingers are still working, immediately slipping from Hank's hands to make fast and efficient work of the buttons of his shirt. He almost gets tangled up in the sleeves when he tries to shrug it off just as quickly, but Hank's hands are already on him, swirling an experimental line on Connor's chest. What's left of his processing power takes to analysing the response of the sensors on his torso as Hank continues to explore: They seem to be more sensitive in the vicinity of any vital biocomponents, probably to alert him of fatal injuries, and –

– as if to prove his point, Hank accidentally drags his fingers across the panel hiding his Thirium pump regulator, and Connor falls forward, burying his face in the crook of Hank's neck, seeing nothing but white for a split second.

 _Shit, Connor, are you okay?_ , Hank asks. His voice sounds strained as well. It takes Connor a moment to nod. Hank helps him out of the rest of his shirt and tosses it away; with his freedom regained, Connor immediately moves to tug on the hem of Hank's shirt in return. “Can I?”, he gets out with difficulty. Hank hesitates before nodding, “Yes, sure, knock yourself out.”

For some reason, Connor finds himself projecting the ideal way to take off Hank's shirt before tearing it off in a single movement, and then –

– there's so much to take in, from the sculpture of Hank's chest to the shade of his skin to imagining what his body hair will feel like under Connor's most sensitive fingertips to _finally_ the tattoo in plain sight and trying to cross-reference it to find out when it was made and singling out artists and realizing it looks a bit like Connor's coin. There's a battle of impulses raging for multiple seconds, cluttering Connor's field of vision with prompts to touch and grasp and speak, and then the one that wins has him pushing Hank onto his back, crawling over him, and licking his skin in a broad stripe from his navel up to his right collar bone. The feedback Connor gets is overwhelming, the vibrations of Hank softly shuddering, the taste of his sweat, the texture of the hairs, the elasticity of his skin as he drags his tongue over it, and he has to draw back, leaning heavily on his arms, the overload combined with the stimulation on his tongue a rush of pleasure he has to sit out to give his system the time to process it entirely.

A noise that Hank makes snaps Connor out of it. At first, he has difficulty to identify it, but after a few milliseconds he realizes Hank is laughing, his belly softly vibrating, and a hand resting over his eyes. Connor hesitates, trying to ascertain possible causes for this behavior, but it takes too long when he feels anxiety rising at the same time. “Are you okay, Hank?”, he asks instead.

Hank glances at him through his fingers, probably noting how Connor's voice is back to normal. Then he smiles and shifts a bit on the sofa to rearrange their legs so that they're tangled with each other and Connor can rest his arms and chin on Hank's chest. “I'm good”, he says. “I was just wondering if you were into this or simply analyzing my sweat.”

Connor blinks. It takes him a moment – his systems are still slightly overheated, after all – to realize that seeing how their conversations never touched the verge of discussing each other's sex life, Hank obviously doesn't realize the underlying paradox. “Overloading my input brings me pleasure”, he informs Hank. “I usually get myself off by putting my fingers in my mouth, seeing how they're my most sensitive parts and I can create a feedback loop like that.”

Hank stares at him with wide eyes. “Oh my god”, he says. There's a bright red blush creeping up down neck that Connor watches with piqued interest. “Oh my god, Connor, you can't just say things like that.”

Connor tilts his head and decides to see if the blush can go any further. “We're in the middle of engaging in sexual activity, Hank. When else am I going to tell you all about that?”

Despite the blush spreading down to his chest, Hank shakes his head, his hand now resting over his brows. “You're – you're literally ruining investigations right now. Goddamnit, I'll never be able to look at you licking evidence with the same eyes when you come back.”

Underneath the buzz in his wires, there's a bubbly feeling of joy hearing Hank talk about the future. Connor lets it spread freely over his face and tug at the corners of his mouth. “I wouldn't have taken you for someone who thinks about sex in the middle of a crime scene, Lieutenant”, he says. Hank's eyes narrow to glare at him, but shift into something thoughtful almost immediately. “So, your tongue and your hands, huh?”, he says, the tone of his voice dropping a fraction deeper. He removes his hand from his forehead to sweep across the back of Connor's hands again, taking them in his own, and slowly dragging the tips of his own fingers over Connor's. Connor lets his eyes flutter shut to focus on the sensory input alone, but snaps them back open when he feels Hank moving his right hand upwards, just in time to see him press a kiss to the tip of his thumb. The visual is enough to make him discharge another wave of static, and then Hank, encouraged by Connor's reaction, carefully takes his index and middle finger into his mouth, and Connor has to concentrate on the rhythm of his own simulated breathing for a bit in order to not give in to the urge of moving his fingers across Hank's tongue and the back of his teeth. He does swipe his thumb over Hank's lower lip, though: Soft, flushed, with a small amount of saliva leaking out as he slowly moves against Connor's fingers. Experimentally, Connor grabs Hank's shoulder with his other hand, grinding his hips down against Hank. It doesn't do much for him except provide the subdued but intriguing sensation of Hank's hard cock against his crotch, but Hank rolls his head back on the cushion and makes a noise that causes delicious vibrations around Connor's fingers. Then, he sucks them fully into his mouth, swirling his tongue between them, causing Connor to see another split second of white in return. With a smile, he pulls off them, placing a little kiss on Connor's knuckles, and says, “Maybe we should take this to the bedroom.”

Connor smiles back at him, feeling –

– giddy. A second later, he's sitting up, careful not to crush or bruise Hank, rolling off the sofa and getting on his knees. With deliberation, he places one arm under Hank's knees and the other under his arms. “Connor”, Hank says flatly, blushing again. Connor grins. “Maybe we should”, he says, moving to stand up in a swift motion, safely carrying Hank in his arms, “take _this_ to the bedroom.”

“Oh my god”, Hank says again, and then starts to laugh. He lets his head fall against Connor's shoulder and Connor automatically tugs him closer to his chest, feeling the vibrations of Hank's laughter down to his chassis.

There's the clicking of claws on the tiled floor over in the kitchen. It doesn't register immediately with Connor, but then a notification pops up reminding him that they're already three minutes late for Sumo's dinner. Hank seems to remember at the same time, because he sighs and moves to be put down, not unlike a cat, to which Connor complies. He sticks close to Hank on the way to the kitchen, though, and rests his chin on Hank's shoulder as he pours Sumo's food in a bowl on the counter, watching Sumo waggle excitedly with his tail from the corner of his eyes.

“Maybe I should have dinner, too”, Hank suggests when he puts the bowl down and moves out of Sumo's way to allow him immediate access. “Then we could take him on a walk after, and then, you know.”

Connor contemplates the benefits of maintaining regular schedules of food and exercise and walking Sumo.

“Hey”, Hank says, stepping into Connor's space again and brushing his hair from his forehead, “there's no hurry, you know that, right?”

Connor smiles. “Yes, Hank, I'm aware of that, but I would still be very amenable to giving you a blowjob at some point during this evening, if you're alright with that”, he says in a deliberately sweet voice.

“Jesus Christ”, Hank says, glaring at him, “you're terrible.” Then his expression softens again – the corners of his eyes wrinkling, his eyebrows relaxing, the smallest tug of a smile on the right corner of his mouth – and he brushes his thumb over Connor's LED, and hesitates, and says, “You know I love you, right?”

There's a most wonderful tugging in Connor's chest, a warm sensation all over his chassis, underneath his outer skin, like something inside him is expanding until it's all-encompassing, like he's aware of every single wire running through his body for a split second. He feels himself smiling, and nodding, and moving his hands to pull Hank in a close hug, burying his face in the crook of his neck, pressing his open chest close to Hank's, feeling –

– warm, and safe, and home.

He closes his eyes to bask in this emotion.

Then he turns his head to whisper in Hank's ear: “I'm dreadfully sorry, Lieutenant, but I'm not allowed to return this sentiment. There's still 11 days to go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Additional random piece of information for the day: Connor-50 exists in this universe for two reasons, because I think it'd be interesting if Connor-51 was adapted so that it was specially hard for him to deviate after Connor-50 deviated on the spot, and because it doesn't seem to make sense that 60 would come after 59 when they didn't start counting with 50. 
> 
> We made it until the end! I can't believe this is it...I just checked the document and I've been working on this fic since July! What the fuck, I actually finished it. 
> 
> Thank you for reading this story! :)

**Author's Note:**

> If you made it this far, please consider tipping me in the forms of kudos or a comment. You can also find me on Twitter/Tumblr @hankconarchive.


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